\y*^ •""* 


UP    AGAINST   IT 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

THE  LADY  OF  THE  NIGHT  WIND 
THE  TWO-FACED  MAN 
THE  GIRL  BY  THE  ROADSIDE 
SOMETHING  DOING 
UP  AGAINST  IT 


"So!    It  was  you!"  he  said.    "You  have  a  heavy  hand, 
Miss  Maitland." 


UP  AGAINST   IT 


By 

VARICK  VANARDY 

Author  of 

"The  Lady  of  the  Night  Wind,"  "The  Two-Faced 

Man,"  "Something  Doing,"    'The  Girl 

by  the  Roadside,"  etc. 


NEW  YORK 
THE  MACAULAY  COMPANY 


COPYRIGHT,   1920,  BT 

THE  MACAULAY  COMPANY 


Printed  in  the  U.  S.  A. 


2138640 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I.  A  Critical  Moment 9 

II.  A  Pair  of  Schemers 22 

III.  The  Fake  Package 33 

IV.  Life— and  the  Right  to  Live 44 

V.  A  Declaration  of  War      . 52 

VI.  With  Dog-like  Devotion 57 

VII.  Randall's  Renunciation 64 

VIII.  Joyce 70 

IX.  At  the  Devil's  Pulpit 81 

X.  The  Dead  Forger 89 

XI.  The  Tragedy  at  Magician 94 

XII.  "I  Will  Stay  Here— and  Fight"      ....  101 

XIII.  Two  Packets  in  Oilskins 112 

XIV.  A  Conspiracy  that  Failed 120 

XV.  Dan  Randall's  Error        .     .     .     .     .     .     .  133 

XVI.  Dan  Randall's  Ultimatum 141 

XVII.  A  Touch  of  the  Tempest 148 

XVIII.  The  Tracks  in  the  Snow 158 

XIX.  Some  Freaks  of  Fortune 168 

XX.  The  Great  Change .  177 

XXI.  Things  Begin  to  Move 185 

XXII.  Preparing  for  the  Contest    ......  196 

XXIII.  The  Last  Night  of  Idleness 203 

XXIV.  Beginning  the  Fight  .     ......     .  213 

XXV.  The  Fight  at  Lonecamp 223 

XXVI.  The  Voices  over  the  Wire 232 

XXVII.  First  Blood 240 

XXVIII.  The  Effect  of  the  Shot 249 

XXIX.  The  Live  Wires .258 

XXX.  War,  to  the  Utmost  Limit 266 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XXXI.  The  Dynamite  Attack 274 

XXXII.  Stampeding  the  Enemy  .     .     .     .     .     .     .283 

XXXIII.  Taggart's  Villainous  Scheme 289 

XXXIV.  At  the  Stone  House 294 

XXXV.  Dan  Randall's  Strategy 300 

XXXVI.  A  Double-Headed  Fight 307 

XXXVII.  Taking  the  Bull  by  the  Horns 312 

XXXVIII.  When  Taggart  Laid  Down 320 

XXXIX.  The  Last  Ditch 326 

XL.  Things  that  Did  Not  Burn 336 

XLI.  A  Cry  for  Help 341 

XLII.  In  the  Nick  of  Time 346 

XLIII.  The  Ways  of  Transgressors 353 

XLIV.  How  One  Man  Could  Hate 361 

XLV.  When  Dreams  Come  True 366 


UP  AGAINST  IT 

CHAPTER  I 
A  Critical  Moment 

Dan  Randall  shoved  his  chair  slowly  back  from 
the  table,  gripping  the  edge  of  it  tightly  between 
his  fingers  as  he  did  so.  His  face  had  gone  white, 
his  jaws  were  set,  and  his  eyes  were  hard.  They 
had  glittered  with  the  utter  cold  of  restrained  an- 
ger since  the  last  half  hour.  The  sensations  pro- 
duced by  the  extremes  of  heat  and  cold  are  much 
the  same,  although  their  manifestations  are  dif- 
ferent. It  was  the  latter  that  affected  Randall,  at 
that  directors'  meeting. 

There  were  eight  others  present  around  the  big 
table  of  solid  oak.  He  was  the  ninth.  One  of  the 
eight  had  betrayed  him,  and  had  been  betraying 
him,  systematically  and  methodically,  for  weeks 
and  months;  had  betrayed  his  friendship,  his  trust, 
his  confidence.  The  other  seven  had  followed 
meekly  (or  purposefully,  it  did  not  matter)  in  the 
wake  of  Ace  Wadleigh— his  friend.  His  friend! 

It  had  been  hard  for  Randall  to  believe. 

The  full  realization  of  the  treachery  of  which  he 
was  the  victim  had  come  slowly.  It  had  all 


10  UP  AGAINST  IT 

seemed  so  incredible,  so  impossible,  at  the  begin- 
ning of  present  developments. 

He  had  refused  to  credit  his  own  perceptions,  at 
first.  Then,  bit  by  bit,  and  minute  by  minute,  the 
conviction  had  grown  upon  him  until  the  point  of 
finality  was  reached  when  the  votes  of  the  direc- 
tors had  been  cast  with  brutal  frankness. 

Randall  was  ousted  from  the  board,  shorn  of  his 
power,  deprived  of  every  atom  of  influence— cast 
out. 

And  the  railroad  was  his,  more  than  anybody's. 
His  brains  had  conceived  it,  his  ability  had  estab- 
lished it,  his  money  had  financed  it;  and  now  he 
was  thrown  out  with  all  the  ruthlessness  that  is 
shown  to  a  drunken  bum  who  has  spent  his  last 
cent  across  a  bar  and  is  turned  into  the  street  be- 
cause of  it.  ...  Only,  Dan  Randall  had  not  ex- 
pended all  of  his  resource's;  not  yet.  He  knew, 
even  as  he  rose  slowly  from  his  chair  at  the  end  of 
the  table,  gripping  it,  that  these  men  would  find 
out  presently,  and  to  their  cost,  that  he  had  not. 
But  he  did  not  choose  to  tell  them  so;  not  just  then. 

The  white  heat  of  instant  anger  is  as  nothing  to 
the  cold  rage  that  is  the  result  of  contemplated 
injustice  remorselessly  dealt  out.  Your  true  gen- 
tleman is  one  who  practices  graciousness,  and  ex- 
acts it;  one  who  is  loyal,  and  who  demands  loy- 
alty; one  who  is  grateful  and  considerate,  and  who 
believes  in  the  gratitude  and  the  consideration  of 
others.  When  one  who  is  born  and  bred  with  such 
principles  confronts  the  moment  which  outrages 
all  of  them  at  once,  just  rage,  bitter  savagery,  re- 
morseless purpose  are  the  immediate  consequences. 

Randall's  eyes  sought  the  gaze  of  Boniface  Wad- 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  11 

leigh,  which  met  his  own  from  the  opposite  end 
of  the  table.  He  ignored  the  other  men.  They 
did  not  count,  save  as  their  votes  just  cast,  had 
counted.  But  the  purpose  which  their  votes  had 
expressed  was  concentrated  in  the  cold,  almost  ex- 
pressionless eyes  of  Wadleigh.  There  was  no  ex- 
altation in  them;  no  evidence  of  the  triumph  he 
had  won  by  those  votes.  They  were  just  coldly 
determined.  And  Wadleigh's  face  was  always  a 
mask.  His  pallor  was  natural,  although  it  was 
more  pronounced  than  usual  at  that  moment.  His 
strong,  handsome,  patrician  features  were  deter- 
mined in  their  utter  calmness.  He  offered  no 
apology,  manifested  no  regret,  spoke  no  word, 
when  Randall  arose  to  confront  him. 

For  a  moment  Randall  stood  quite  still,  with- 
out speaking.  He  was  loosing  his  grip  on  the 
table-edge  in  order  to  get  one  upon  himself. 
When  he  did  speak  it  was  in  a  low  tone,  and  with- 
out the  expression  of  an  emotion;  calmly  and 
clearly.  He  said: 

"It  has  been  moved  and  seconded  that  we  now 
adjourn,  subject  to  the  call  of  the  new  president 
just  elected.  Those  in  favor  will  signify  it  by  say- 
ing aye.  ...  It  is  so  ordered.  .  .  .  Gentlemen, 
keep  your  places.  It  will  not  be  well  for  any  of 
you  to  attempt  to  leave  this  room  just  yet.  Mr. 
Wadleigh  would  not  be  entirely  safe  from  me. 
With  the  restraining  influence  of  your  presence,  he 
is  quite  so.  For  the  remainder  of  what  I  have  to 
say,  Wadleigh,  /  will  address  you.  The  others 
who  are  here,  while  competent  witnesses,  possess 
no  other  attribute  of  manhood  which  is  perceptible, 
and  therefore  may  be  ignored.  .  .  .  They  have 


12  UP  AGAINST  IT 

done  as  they  were  told  to  do.  ...  But,  you •  !" 

Randall  shrugged  slightly,  but  he  did  not  smile. 
The  occasion  was  not  one  for  smiling. 

"I  have  been  the  president  of  the  M.  and  J.  rail- 
way company  since  its  inception,  until  to-day. 
Now  I  am  ousted  from  that  position  and  you  are 
elected  in  my  place.  The  position  of  treasurer, 
formerly  held  by  you,  is  now  filled  by  Ellery  Cuth- 
bcrt,  who  is  present.  I  have  been  robbed,  sys- 
tematically and  deliberately,  and  you,  Wadleigh, 
are  the  thief.  It  is  a  hard  word,  I  know,  but  no 
other  one  fits  the  occasion.  You  have  picked  my 
pockets  with  this  'mob'  around  you  to  aid  you  in 
the  act.  You  have  climbed  in  at  the  second  story 
window  of  my  confidence  while  I  was  sleeping, 
drugged  to  insensibility  by  my  faith  in  you.  You 
have  garroted  me  from  a  hidden  doorway  while  I 
stood  with  my  back  turned,  looking  at  the  lights 
across  the  street  of  my  ambition.  You  are  worse 
than  the  thief,  the  pickpocket,  and  the  footpad,  be- 
cause you  added  to  them  the  facilities  and  the  per- 
suasiveness of  a  confidence-man.  My  utter  amaze- 
ment at  what  has  happened,  explains  my  calmness. 
I  am  benumbed. 

"But  my  intelligence  is  active,  and  it  shall  not 
cease  to  be  on  the  alert,  henceforth.  You  shall  be 
made  to  pay,  Wadleigh,  cent  per  cent.  Consider 
well  that  statement  when  I  have  gone  away.  .  .  . 

"At  the  stockholders'  meeting  which  immedi- 
ately preceded  this  directors'  meeting,  your 
method  and  manner  of  voting  the  stock  which 
rightfully  is  mine,  should  have  enlightened  me. 
But  it  did  not.  It  is  as  well,  perhaps,  that  I  do  not 
understand,  yet,  how  you  acquired  that  power.  I 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  13 

cannot  permit  myself  to  think  that  Miss  Maitland 
knew  to  what  use  you  would  put  it  when  she  was 
persuaded  to  confer  it  upon  you,  in  my  absence. 
But  I  will  know  all  about  that  circumstance, 
later.  So  much  for  that,  Wadleigh.  These  pup- 
pets of  yours  do  not  understand  me.  But  you 
do.  ... 

"So  far  as  I  am  personally  concerned,  the  M. 
and  J.  railroad  company  ceases  to  exist  with  this 
hour.  You  have  it  all— you  and  your  stalagmites; 
for  it  is  the  ooze  that  has  dripped  from  you  that 
has  created  them.  .  .  .  You  believe,  too,  that  you 
have  me  broke,  and  helpless.  Perhaps  you  have. 
Time  will  answer  that.  But,  whether  it  is  so  or 
not,  what  you  have  done  to-day,  Wadleigh,  spells 
Ruin.  R-u-i-n.  Think  that  over,  too,  for  I  do  not 
refer  to  myself,  but  to  you. 

"Now,  to  the  business  aspect  of  the  situation. 
There  is  one  item  which  you  have  not  taken  into 
account.  You  would  have  acted  with  less  precipi- 
tancy had  you  done  so.  You  wouldn't  have 
thrown  me  down  quite  so  hard.  I  refer  to  the 
Lantowa  cut-off,  between  Magician  and  Janver. 
That  is  mine.  Every  inch  of  that  right  of  way  be- 
longs to  me  and  stands  in  my  name,  the  deeds  and 
patents  thereto  being  duly  and  legally  recorded. 
You  had  forgotten  that,  hadn't  you?  or  rather,  you 
did  not  remember  it,  in  your  haste  to  rob  me.  But 
it  is  mine,  and  this  Dominion  of  Canada  has  recog- 
nized my  title  to  it.  ...  It  startles  you,  doesn't 
it?" 

Ace  Wadleigh  bent  forward  in  his  chair  and 
stretched  out  one  hand  toward  a  package  of  papers 
on  the  table  in  front  of  him;  but  his  muscles  re- 


14  UP  AGAINST  IT 

laxed  and  the  hand  was  withdrawn  ere  it  had 
touched  the  papers,  and  Wadleigh  resumed  his 
former  position,  a  slow  smile  twitching  at  the  cor- 
ners of  his  mouth. 

He  spoke  for  the  first  time,  for  until  then  he  had 
not  betrayed  by  any  other  sign  than  the  cold 
gleam  in  his  eyes,  that  he  had  heard  the  words  ad- 
dressed to  him. 

"You  will  find  that  nothing  has  been  forgotten," 
he  said.  His  face  might  have  been  hewn  from 
marble  in  its  utter  coldness  and  calmness.  "And 
now,  since  you  are  no  longer  one  of  us,  and  because 
it  is  my  duty  to  preside  at  a  meeting  of  the  newly- 
elected  directors  of  the  Manitoba  &  Juneau  Rail- 
road Company,  I  must  request  that  you  leave  the 
room." 

Randall  did  not  reply. 

During  a  moment  of  tense  silence  he  stared  into 
Wadleigh's  eyes,  and  the  gaze  was  returned  with- 
out a  flicker  or  an  evidence  of  flinching. 

Then  Randall  stepped  away  from  the  end  of  the 
table,  crossed  to  his  own  roll-top  desk,  the  top  of 
which  was  thrown  back,  and  began  with  delibera- 
tion to  dismantle  the  pigeon-holes  of  their  con- 
tents. After  a  moment  he  turned  and  drew  his 
swivel-chair  toward  him  from  the  end  of  the  direc- 
tor's table,  and  seated  himself  upon  it,  once  more 
giving  his  attention  to  his  desk.  He  entirely  ig- 
nored the  presence  of  others  in  the  room,  and  there 
was  no  haste  in  his  movements  as  he  worked.  But 
there  was  a  mirror  which  hung  against  the  wall 
just  above  his  desk,  and  from  time  to  time  he 
glanced  toward  it,  and  thus  he  saw  Wadleigh  nod 
significantly  to  Cuthbert,  the  newly-elected  treas- 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  15 

urer  of  the  corporation.  Cuthbert  rose  in  his 
place  at  the  table. 

"Mr.  President,"  he  said,  "I  move  that  the 
board  of  directors  of  the  Manitoba  &  Juneau  Rail- 
road Company  be  now  convened,  and  that  if  there 
is  any  person  present  who  is  not  a  member  of  that 
board,  he  be  requested  to  leave  the  room."  He 
hesitated  an  instant,  and  then  added,  with  a  slight 
thrust  forward  of  his  chin:  "And  I  suggest  that 
in  case  of  the  failure  or  refusal  of  such  a  person  to 
leave  this  room  upon  request,  he  be  ejected." 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence.  The  directors 
waited;  Randall  continued  with  his  occupation, 
imperturbably.  The  strain  of  the  moment  was  in- 
tense. Then  Wadleigh  spoke. 

"You  heard,  Randall?"  he  said. 

Randall  made  no  reply.  He  bent  forward  over 
his  desk  and  pulled  out  one  of  the  smaller  draw- 
ers beneath  the  pigeon-holes;  and  what  he  did  then 
was  as  if  in  the  regular  course  of  clearing  out  the 
desk.  He  lifted  a  Colt  automatic  from  the  inte- 
rior of  that  small  drawer,  held  it  in  his  hands  for 
a  moment  while  he  examined  it,  and  then  dropped 
it  negligently  into  his  coat  pocket. 

The  mirror  over  his  desk  told  him  that  the  sig- 
nificance of  his  act  had  not  passed  unnoticed.  Un- 
easy glances  were  shot  from  man  to  man  around 
the  directors'  table.  Only  Wadleigh  appeared  to 
be  unimpressed.  He  left  his  chair  and  approached 
Randall— and  the  latter  man  sat  very  still  indeed 
while  he  waited.  Wadleigh  stopped  at  the  end  of 
the  desk. 

"Will  you  go  out,  peacefully,  Randall?"  he 
asked. 


16  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Yes;  when  I  have  finished  with  what  I  have  to 
do,  here,"  was  the  slow  reply.  Then  he  leaned 
back  in  his  chair  and  whirled  it  slowly  until  he 
faced  the  new  president  of  the  railroad  company, 
adding:  "I  will  not  go,  under  any  circumstances, 
until  then." 

"There  are  eight  of  us  here,  Dan,"  Wadleigh 
said,  with  meaning.  Randall  took  the  gun  from 
his  pocket,  looked  upon  it  meditatively  for  a  mo- 
ment, and  returned  it. 

"That  happens  to  be  the  precise  number  of  pel- 
lets in  this  pill-box,"  he  said,  and  turned  back 
toward  the  desk  again. 

"Would  you  use  that?" 

"I  shall  protect  myself— and  my  property  and 
interest— to  the  last  ditch,"  was  the  quiet  reply. 
He  spoke  without  turning  his  head. 

One  of  the  directors,  Taggart  by  name,  who  had 
been  lumber- jack,  fur-trader,  and  a  hard-rock  man 
in  his  career,  but  who  had  become  a  successful 
contractor  in  later  years,  sprang  to  his  feet. 

"You're  not  the  only  man  who's  got  a  gun  on 
him,  Randall,"  he  called  out,  savagely.  "I  guess 
we've  all  got  at  least  one.  Here's  mine  right  here 
in  my  hand,  and  it's  pointing  plumb  at  you,  too. 
Now  you  climb  up  outa  that  chair  and  chase  your- 
self through  that  door,  mister,  and  if  you  wiggle 
a  finger  toward  that  pocket ' 

"Sit  down,  Ben!"  Wadleigh  interrupted, 
sharply.  "None  of  that.  It  doesn't  pay.  Sit 
down,  I  say,  and  put  that  gun  in  your  pocket.  Let 
him  finish  what  he  is  doing.  It  won't  take  long, 
a-nd  there's  plenty  of  time." 

Randall  waited  until  Taggart  had  obeyed  the 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  17 

request  of  Wadleigh.  Then  he  pulled  down  the 
desk-top,  snapped  the  lock,  and  turned  his  chair 
slowly  around  until  he  faced  them  all. 

"If  one  of  you  will  open  that  door  into  the  hall 
so  I  can  roll  this  desk  out  of  the  room,  I  won't! 
trouble  you  any  farther,"  he  said,  mildly. 

"That  desk  is  the  property  of  the  company," 
Wadleigh  remarked.  "It  cannot  leave  the 
room." 

"On  the  contrary,  it  is  my  personal  property, 
and  it  goes  out  with  me,  Ace." 

Randall  stood  upon  his  feet,  facing  them.  His 
right  hand  again  sought  his  coat  pocket,  and  was 
withdrawn  with  the  automatic  in  its  grasp.  He 
knew  the  men  who  were  gathered  around  that  di- 
rectors' table.  He  knew,  also,  that  half  measures 
would  not  "go"  with  them. 

All  of  them  save  Wadleigh  started  to  their  feet, 
and  more  than  one  hand  moved  toward  a  con- 
cealed weapon;  and  Randall  raised  his  pistol  so 
that  it  flickered  from  man  to  man,  briefly.  With- 
out exception  their  hands  dropped  again  to  their 
sides,  their  arms  hanging  straight  downward. 
Wadleigh  alone  had  made  no  motions,  and  ap- 
peared unimpressed.  But  Ace  Wadleigh  bore  the 
reputation  of  never  changing  countenance  and  of 
never  being  in  haste,  under  any  circumstance. 

"I  have  won  some  recognition  among  you  for 
markmanship,"  Randall  said,  coolly,  "but  I  don't 
think  that  any  of  us  want  an  exhibition  of  it  here. 
It  would  be  the  height  of  absurdity.  But,  I  shall 
not  put  away  this  gun  now  until  I  and  my  desk  are 
safely  outside  of  that  door,  and  I  shall  not  hesitate 
to  resent,  with  emphasis,  the  slightest  sign  of  in- 


18  UP  AGAINST  IT 

terference.  If  you  force  me  to  extremes— well,  in 
that  case  it  will  be  a  matter  of  indifference  to  me 
who  gets  hurt." 

The  moment  was  critical. 

The  slightest  ill-advised  movement  by  any  man 
in  that  room  would  have  precipitated  matters  in- 
stantly. Randall  knew  it;  the  men  who  faced  him 
realized  it.  Wadleigh  alone  seemed  to  be  pon- 
dering upon  something  that  was  quite  foreign  to 
the  menacing  situation.  His  eyes  had  left  Ran- 
dall's face  and  sought  the  closed  and  locked  desk. 
There  was  something  inside  of  it  that  he  wanted, 
he  thought,  and  he  had  supposed  it  would  be  an 
easy  matter  to  get  it  by  driving  Randall  from  the 
room. 

But  Wadleigh  understood  perfectly  well— per- 
haps much  better  than  the  others,  for  he  had  a 
much  more  thorough  acquaintance  with  Randall 
than  they  had— that  the  desk  could  not  be  opened 
again  inside  of  that  room  without  bloodshed;  and 
bloodshed  was  to  be  avoided  at  all  hazards.  So  he 
thought  deeply,  and  swiftly;  and  evidently  he  be- 
lieved that  he  saw  a  way  by  which  his  desires 
might  be  accomplished.  He  shrugged  his  shoul- 
ders; an  emphatic  gesture  with  him  who  rarely 
gestured  at  all. 

' '  Very  well, ' '  he  said.  ' '  You  and  the  desk  shall 
leave  the  room  together." 

He  turned  upon  his  heel  and  strode  toward  the 
door.  His  hand  touched  the  knob,  and  clicked  it 
—and  at  that  precise  instant  somebody  rapped 
against  the  panel  at  the  opposite  side  of  it. 

Had  that  rapping  occurred  an  instant  sooner, 
before  he  had  touched  the  door-knob,  Wadleigh 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  19 

might  not  have  responded.  As  it  was,  he  contin- 
ued the  turn  of  the  knob  that  he  had  already  be- 
gun, and  jerked  the  door  open.  Then  he  took  a 
quick  step  backward,  and  something  very  like  a 
gasp  of  astonishment  escaped  every  man  in  that 
room,  except  Randall,  whose  back  was  toward  the 
doorway. 

Joyce  Maitland,  hooded  and  furred,  stood  at  the 
threshold. 

The  glow  of  the  silent  cold  without  was  upon 
her  cheeks,  the  sparkle  of  the  bright  sun  on  the 
frozen  snow  banks  was  in  her  darkly  luminous 
eyes,  and  health,  vivacity,  energy,  and  courage  ra- 
diated from  her  as  she  took  one  step  forward  and 
paused  uncertainly,  amazed  by  the  aspect  of  the 
tableau  she  had  interrupted.  Seven  men  standing 
around  a  huge  table  facing  another  man,  and  that 
other  with  a  weapon  in  his  right  hand,  defying1 
them— or  menacing  them.  .  .  .  Which?  She  did 
not  know.  She  could  not  determine. 

Randall  was  the  only  one  there  who  did  not  sus- 
pect her  presence.  He  had  heard  the  tap  at  the 
door,  but  he  had  no  means  of  knowing  that  it  was 
not  a  prearranged  signal  anticipated  by  his  com- 
panions within  the  room,  and  he  did  not  care,  just 
yet,  to  turn  his  eyes  away  from  his  watchfulness 
over  them.  Of  the  seven  who  faced  him  there 
were  at  least  three  who  would  not  hesitate  to  take 
advantage  of  his  slightest  inattention.  He  might 
be  shot  down  without  compunction,  in  that  room, 
with  eight  reputable  witnesses  to  testify  to  how  it 
had  happened  (?)— and  he  with  a  gun  in  his  own 
hand. 

Joyce  Maitland 's  first  act  of  greeting  when  the 


20  UP  AGAINST  IT 

door  opened  had  been  a  nod  to  Wadleigh,  brightly 
bestowed;  then  her  glances  flew  to  the  scene  she 
had  interrupted.  The  glow  in  her  cheeks  did  not 
perceptibly  lessen,  but  her  eyes  widened  and  her 
lips  lost  their  smile,  as  if  she  had  some  small  con- 
ception of  what  was  going  on.  Then  her  ready  wit 
saved  the  situation. 

"I  hope  I'm  not  intruding,"  she  said;  and  Ran- 
dall spun  around  on  his  heel  and  dropped  the 
weapon  into  his  pocket  as  he  faced  her.  The  men 
at  the  table  sank  upon  their  respective  chairs. 
Wadleigh  stepped  backward  farther  into  the  room, 
and  Joyce  followed  him.  The  door  remained 
wide  open.  Then  she  added:  "Is  it  a  rehearsal 
of  some  sort?" 

"Dan  was  giving  us  a  lesson  in  the  art  of  pre- 
paredness; that  is  all,"  Wadleigh  replied.  "He 
was  demonstrating  to  us  the  facility  with  which  a 
man  may  draw,  and  perhaps  use,  a  gun,  in  an  ex- 
tremity. He  is  moving  his  desk  into  another 
room  and  my  part  of  the  work  was  to  open  the 
door.  .  .  .  Taggart,  if  you  and  Cuthbert  will  lend 
a  hand  I  think  we  will  roll  the  desk  outside,  now. 
.  .  .  You  see,  Joyce,  Dan  has  an  idea  that  there 
are  too  many  interruptions  in  this  big  office,  so  he's 
going  to  flock  by  himself  for  a  while." 

Joyce  Maitland's  eyes  rested  for  a  moment  upon 
Randall's  face.  He  made  her  no  attempted  apol- 
ogy for  the  scene  she  had  interrupted;  he  offered 
no  lame  explanation.  He  did  not  speak  at  all,  nor 
did  he  look  at  her  again  after  that  first  glance  of 
astonishment;  and  she  was  suddenly  conscious 
there  had  been  no  smile  of  pleasure  from  him  at 
seeing  her,  no  welcoming  expression  in  his  eyes. 


A  CRITICAL  MOMENT  21 

Taggart  and  Cuthbert,  with  the  aid  of  Crosby, 
the  newly-elected  secretary  of  the  company, 
pushed  the  desk  into  the  hall.  Another  shoved 
out  the  chair  that  belonged  to  it.  Then  Randall 
put  on  his  fur  coat  and  cap  and  the  laced  boots 
that  were  made  to  fit  over  his  house-shoes.  H© 
turned  toward  the  door  without  another  glance 
toward  Joyce. 

But  she  stepped  quickly  to  his  side  and  rested 
her  hand  upon  his  arm. 

"  What  is  it,  Dan?  What  has  happened?  What 
is  happening?"  she  asked,  putting  one  question 
after  another,  quickly. 

He  paused  with  his  hand  on  the  knob  of  the 
door,  which  had  been  closed  when  the  desk  and 
chair  were  moved  out  of  the  room.  There  was  no 
harshness  in  his  manner  or  his  words  as  he  an- 
swered her;  but  there  was  distance,  even  though 
there  was  the  glimmer  of  a  smile — not  a  pleasant 
one,  quite— in  his  eyes,  as  he  spoke  in  reply. 

"I  am  moving  out,"  he  said,  "out  of  the  com- 
pany I  have  been  in.  And  that  term  applies  to 
persons  as  well  as  to  a  railroad.  My  own  stock 
has  been  voted  against  me  to-day,  and  you  should 
understand  why  that  is  so,  better  than  I  could  tell 
you." 

Then  he  opened  the  door,  passed  into  the  hall- 
way, and  closed  it  after  him. 


CHAPTER  II 
A  Pair  of  Schemers 

Dan  Randall  made  a  grievous  mistake  when  he 
went  out  of  that  room  and  left  Miss  Maitland  no 
choice  but  to  hear  and  to  accept  the  explanations 
that  were  made  to  her  by  Ace  Wadleigh  and  his 
companions. 

"It  is  just  a  foolish  little  flash  of  temper  on  the 
part  of  Dan,' '  Wadleigh  told  her,  soothingly,  while 
he  brought  forward  a  chair.  "And  that  last  re- 
mark of  his  before  he  went  out  was  an  exhibition 
of  it.  You  see,  Joyce,  he  permitted  himself  to  get 
angry  about  a  misconception  of  his  own,  in  regard 
to  the  Lantowa  cut-off;  that  eight  and  a  half  miles 
of  road  that  we  are  going  to  build  over  Magician 
pass.  You  know  about  that,  don't  you?" 

"I'm  afraid  that  I  don't  know  about  it,  Ace," 
she  replied.  "I  have  never  heard  of  it." 

"There  isn't  very  much  to  know,  when  all  is 
said.  The  point  is  that  the  distance  from  Janyer, 
where  we  now  are,  to  Magician,  is  fifty-six  miles 
by  the  present  route;  but  Dan  and  I  put  our  heads 
together  and  figured  on  the  pass  over  Lantowa 
mountain.  We  decided  that  it  was  practicable, 
and  now  the  thing  is  in  shape  to  reduce  that  fifty- 
six  miles  to  eight  and  a  half.  Then- — ' ' 

Joyce  was  palpably  impatient,  and  she  mani- 
fested it  that  moment  by  interrupting  him.  He 


A  PAIR  OF  SCHEMERS  23 

had  been  talking  rapidly  with  the  too  evident  de- 
sire to  direct  her  thoughts  away  from  the  scene 
she  had  just  witnessed,  while  as  a  matter  of  fact 
she  was  paying  no  attention  to  what  he  was  saying. 

"You  quarreled,"  she  broke  in  upon  him.  It 
was  both  a  question  and  an  assertion. 

"Well,  yes.  That  is,  Dan  quarreled.  I  didn't. 
These  gentlemen  here,  and  you  know  every  one  of 
them,  will  assure  you  that  Dan  did  all  the  quar- 
reling, and  that  I  didn't  do  any  of  it." 

"Never  mind  that.  What  was  the  quarrel 
about?" 

"Joyce,  when  men  undertake  a  great  enterprise 
such  as  this  one  is,  it  is  not  possible  in  all  things  to 
rely  upon  the  judgment  of  one  man,  or  even  two, 
and  so  they  institute  a  board  of  directors.  The 
persons  who  are  in  this  room  now— including 
yourself— constitute  that  board.  Wait  a  moment 
until  I  finish  explaining.  Dan  became  angry  at 
the  meeting,  and  resigned,  not  only  from  the 
board,  but  from  the  presidency  of  the  company. 
We  didn't  like  the  manner  in  which  he  resigned, 
and  to  teach  him  a  lesson,  we  accepted  the  situa- 
tion. When  he  saw  that  he  had  resigned  himself 
out  of  the  board  of  directors,  and  the  presidency  of 
the  company,  too,  and  that  we  had  taken  him  at  his 
word,  he  was  just  plain  mad;  and  then,  when  you 
were  elected  to  the  board  in  his  place,  and  I  was 
chosen  as  the  president,  Dan  pulled  his  gun,  and 
threatened  us  all.  And  now,  if  you  will  take  that 
chair  beside  Mr.  Cuthbert,  I'll  call  the  meeting  to 
order  and  we  will  proceed.  If  you  require  any 
further  explanations,  they  can  be  made  after- 
ward." 


24  UP  AGAINST  IT 

She  hesitated  for  the  briefest  instant.  Then  she 
moved  toward  the  door. 

"  No, "  she  said.  ' '  You  can  proceed  without  me. 
And  I  don't  think  that  I  care  to  be  a  member  of 
your  board.  I  would  be  an  obstacle  rather  than  a 
help  to  you." 

She  stepped  swiftly  toward  the  door,  but  Wad- 
leigh had  watched  her  narrowly  during  the  entire 
interview,  and  he  reached  it  first  without  appear- 
ing to  be  in  haste.  Indeed,  he  approached  it  so 
naturally  that  he  gave  merely  the  impression  of  an 
intention  to  open  it  for  her  to  pass  through.  Still, 
he  managed  to  obstruct  her  way.  He  had  no  de- 
sire that  she  should  find  opportunity  just  then  for 
an  interview  with  Dan  Randall. 

But  that  was  just  what  she  did  want,  although 
it  did  not  occur  to  her  that  Wadleigh  was  endeav- 
oring to  prevent  one.  She  saw  only  his  wish  to 
have  her  remain;  and  so  she  stepped  around  him 
and  past  him  to  the  door,  smiling  as  she  did  so, 
and  opened  it;  and  as  that  was  done,  Wadleigh 
breathed  a  sigh  of  relief. 

Randall  was  not  there. 

The  wide  corridor  was  untenanted  save  by  the 
desk  that  had  been  rolled  into  it  from  the  office  of 
the  M.  &  J.  R.  R.  office.  That  was  there,  backed 
up  against  the  wall  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  cor- 
ridor. Randall  had  gone. 

Wadleigh  held  out  both  hands,  palms  upward, 
and  shrugged  expressively— for  he  could  be  as  ex- 
pressive as  another  when  occasion  called  for  it. 
Just  then  he  felt  that  it  did.  The  girl  who  stood 
beside  him  was  the  most  important  factor  in  his 
entire  scheme  of  successful  personal  aggrandize- 


A  PAIE  OF  SCHEMERS  25 

ment.  He  well  knew  that  she  could  not  be  forced, 
nor  urged,  nor  led,  nor  coaxed,  into  the  perform- 
ance of  any  act;  she  could  only  be  persuaded— and 
he  relied  upon  his  own  powers  of  persuasion. 
Wadleigh  possessed  unbounded  faith  in  his  own  di- 
plomacy. 

"Dan  has  gone  away,"  he  said,  before  she  could 
speak.  '  'I  suppose  the  sight  of  you,  Joyce,  cooled 
him  off  a  bit." 

Three  of  the  seven  directors  remaining  in  the 
room  had  followed  as  far  as  the  doorway,  and 
Wadleigh  turned  quickly  toward  them.  They 
could  see  that  he  closed  one  eye  in  a  long  wink, 
when  he  continued  to  speak,  and  he  went  on  with- 
out an  apparent  interruption: 

"He'll  return  presently,  and  be  sorry  for  it  all." 
He  swung  around  again  so  that  he  faced  Joyce. 
"And  when  he  comes  back,  we  will  reinstate  him 
on  the  board,  and  I  will  step  down  and  out  of  the 
presidency,  too,  so  that  he  can  have  his  old  place." 

"Surest  thing  you  know,  Miss  Maitland,"  said 
Ben  Taggart  in  his  gruff  voice,  and  with  a  big 
laugh.  "We'll  put  him  right  where  he  belongs. 
Don't  you  get  any  wrong  idee  about  that." 

"Certainly  we  will,"  Wadleigh  said,  echoing 
the  laugh.  "Ben,  you  and  Cuthbert  roll  his  desk 
back  into  the  room,  in  its  old  place;  and  when  Dan 
comes  in  we'll  act  just  as  though  this  thing  hadn't 
happened  at  all."  He  turned  toward  Joyce  again. 
"I'll  tell  you  what  we'll  do;  we'll  re-elect  him) 
president  and  director  before  he  gets  back.  Eh, 
Ben?  That  will  settle  all  that. ' ' 

"You  bet  we  will,"  was  the  chuckling  reply 
from  the  ex-lumberjack. 


26  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Joyce  Maitland  extended  both  her  hands  toward 
Wadleigh,  and  he  grasped  them,  perhaps  with 
more  enthusiasm  than  the  occasion  called  for. 

"That  is  so  like  you,  Ace,"  she  said,  simply. 
"You  are  always  thoughtful  and  considerate  for 
others;  and  really,  I  shudder  when  I  think  what  it 
would  mean  to  Dan  if  anything  happened  to  upset 
his  plans.  He  has  built  so  much  upon  them.  Only 
last  evening "  she  paused  abruptly;  and  Wad- 
leigh was  far  too  wise  to  ask  her  to  continue.  Be- 
sides, he  was  a  far-seeing  person,  and  he  already 
knew  about  the  interview  to  which  she  referred. 
He  had  been  an  unsuspected  eavesdropper  to  it, 
himself,  and  it  was  because  he  did  know  about  it, 
that  the  directors'  meeting  and  the  betrayal  result- 
ing from  it  had  been  sprung  upon  Dan  Randall 
that  morning. 

He  conducted  her  to  the  head  of  the  stairs,  for 
the  building  which  contained  the  executive  of- 
fices of  the  M.  &  J.  R.  R.  Co.  was  only  two  stories 
high  and  was  made  of  lumber.  It  fronted  upon 
the  "square,"  now  deep  with  snow.  Every  build- 
ing of  any  pretention  in  Janver  looked  out  upon 
the  "square." 

Joyce  nodded  brightly  to  him  as  she  descended 
the  stairs,  and  he  turned  leisurely  away;  but  the 
next  instant  he  sprang  forward  toward  the  office, 
passed  inside,  and  closed  the  door. 

"Scatter,  now,  every  one  of  you  but  Cuthbert," 
he  said.  "I  want  him  here  with  me.  Get  out  on 
the  square.  I  don't  want  Joyce  Maitland  to  have 
an  opportunity  to  talk  with  Randall.  After  to-day 
it  won't  make  any  difference,  but  for  to-day  it  must 
be  prevented.  If  they  meet,  and  talk,  interrupt 


A  PAIR  OF  SCHEMERS  27 

them.  I  don't  care  a  hang  how  you  do  it.  And 
don't  let  him  come  back  here,  either,  until  I  have 
gone  through  that  desk,  and  shoved  it  back  into 
the  hall." 

Taggart  was  the  first  man  to  seize  his  furs  and 
go;  the  others  followed,  one  by  one;  but  Wadleigh 
paid  no  further  attention  to  them.  He  had  given 
his  orders,  and  he  expected  to  be  obeyed.  He  was 
already  busy  with  the  lock  of  Randall's  desk,  seek- 
ing to  open  it.  But  he  was  not  wasting  time  by 
trying  keys.  He  had  done  that  before.  A  lum- 
berman's two-bitted  axe,  which  stood  in  one  cor- 
ner of  the  room,  was  the  key  he  used,  and  he  forced 
one  of  the  edges  of  it  beneath  the  lid  of  the  desk 
and  pried  upward. 

The  others  had  gone  and  Cuthbert  was  stand- 
ing beside  him  when  the  hook-bolt  of  the  lock 
snapped  and  he  threw  the  roll-top  back  into  the 
desk. 

All  of  Wadleigh 's  powers  of  self -repression  were 
needed  then,  for  staring  up  at  the  two  men  from 
the  interior  of  the  desk  where  Randall  had  left  it, 
was  a  sheet  of  paper  upon  which,  in  printed  let- 
ters, he  had  inscribed: 

Thieves  will  break  open  this  desk. 

The  thieves  will  not  find  what  they  seek. 

Cuthbert 's  little  eyes  glittered  savagely  and  he 
swore  softly  to  himself;  a  Habit  of  his  when  he  was 
unduly  roused.  It  betokened  a  dangerous  mood  on 
his  part,  too.  Wadleigh  said  nothing.  He  shut 
down  the  lid  of  the  desk  again,  without  search- 
ing it. 

' '  There  is  no  use, ' '  he  said,  resignedly.  ' '  Never 
mind  the  desk.  Let  it  stay  where  it  is.  Randall 


28  UP  AGAINST  IT 

won't  come  back  after  it;  or,  if  he  does— we'll  see 
about  it  when  the  time  comes.  I  made  just  one 
mistake  at  that  meeting,  Cuthbert.  I  should  have 
told  Ben  Taggart  to  shoot  when  he  had  the  drop 
on  Randall." 

"Yes;  that  would  have  been  fine,  wouldn't  it, 
with  Miss  Maitland  blowin'  in  here  two  minutes 
afterward?  But  you'd -a,  slipped  out  of  it,  Ace, 
with  your  smooth  ways.  What  are  you  going  to 
do  now?" 

Wadleigh  did  not  reply.  Instead  he  crossed  to 
a  window  of  the  room  and  with  both  hands  thrust 
deeply  into  his  pocket,  stood  for  a  time  staring  out 
of  it;  and  Cuthbert  waited.  He  had  very  little 
personal  liking  for  Wadleigh,  but  he  thoroughly 
respected  the  powers  of  intellect  which  the  new 
president  of  the  railroad  possessed. 

After  a  moment  or  two  Wadleigh  spoke  without 
turning.  The  subject  of  his  remark  was  appar- 
ently an  extrinsic  one.  He  demanded: 

"What  has  become  of  that  bum  Gaffney? 
Where  is  he?" 

"Drunk.  He's  dead  to  the  world.  He  was 
sound  asleep  and  snoring,  two  hours  ago,  down  at 
Thompson's,  and  Lightfoot  was  keeping  watch. 
He's  safe  enough." 

"All  the  same  we  must  get  him  out  of  the  town 
—now.  Right  away,  too.  I  wouldn't  trust  him, 
Cuthbert,  as  far  as  I  could  throw  a  bull  by  the  tail. 
We've  got  to  get  him  away  from  Janver  before 
another  day.  That's  all  there  is  about  that." 

"I'd  like  to  see  you  do  it— or  anybody  else, 
either,"  Cuthbert  replied  with  a  derisive  chuckle. 
"The  road  is  blocked  both  ways  from  here,  and 


A  PAIR  OF  SCHEMERS  29 

has  been,  for  three  days,  as  you  know.  If  it 
wasn't  for  that  you  couldn't  have  kept  him  here 
at  all,  nor  have  done  with  him  what  you  did  do. 
And  you  know  that,  too." 

"All  the  same  we've  got  to  get  rid  of  him." 

"Well,  then,  you'll  have  to  shoot  him,  or  poison 
him,  or  knock  him  on  the  head,  or  put  him  outside 
to-night  and  let  him  freeze— and  I  don't  fancy  that 
any  of  them  ways  would  be  surpassingly  healthy 
—for  the  fellow  that  done  it." 

"There's  another  thing  that  must  be  done,  too. 
Those  deeds  must  be  taken  to  Magician,  and  re- 
corded." 

'  'All  right,  you  take  'em.  I  ain't  seen  any  air-o- 
planes  flying  around  Janver;  not  lately.  And  I 
wouldn't  know  how  to  run  it  if  I  should  happen  to 
trip  over  one  on  the  Square.  And  there  ain't  no 
other  way  to  get  to  Magician  till  the  plows  work 
their  way  through  Rickett's  canyon;  not  that  I 
know  of." 

"How  about  the  pass?    Couldn't  it  be  done?" 

"/  couldn't  do  it.  It's  sixty  below  up  there, 
right  now." 

"This  affair  has  come  to  a  head  too  soon." 

"Well,  whose  fault  is  that?" 

"Look  here,  Cuthbert,  it's  not  yours,  nor  mine, 
nor  any  person's.  It's  the  fault  of  circumstance. 
But  it  must  be  met  just  the  same,  and  we've  got  to 
meet  it.  Those  deeds  that  Gaffney  prepared  for  us 
are  ready  to  record.  They've  got  to  be  recorded, 
and  that's  all  there  is  about  that.  Somebody  has 
got  to  go  to  Magician,  over  the  pass,  and  take 
Gaffney  with  him." 

"What  the " 


30  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"And  lose  him  on  the  way;  see?  There  isn't  a 
better  place  on  the  footstool  to  lose  a  man  and  let 
him  perish,  than  on  that  pass  between  here  and 
Magician.  Who  can  do  it? 

"Search  me.  I  know  that  I  won't.  Ben  might. 
That's  his  long  suit,  and  he's  had  more  experience 
at  that  sort-a  thing  than  all  the  rest  of  us  put  to- 
gether. And  besides " 

"And  besides,  you  and  Ben  and  I  are  the  only 
ones  of  the  bunch  who  know  the  truth  about  those 
deeds.  Randall  thought  I  had  forgotten  them. 
He'll  find  out  whether  I  forgot  them  or  not.  I  had 
them  right  there  on  the  table  in  front  of  me  when 
he  threw  his  ownership  of  that  right-of-way  at  me; 
and  I  come  near  to  showing  them  to  him,  and  bluff- 
ing it  out.  But  I  wanted  those  other  deeds  of  his, 
first.  They'll  be  the  old  ones  when  these  are  re- 
corded, but  the  possession  of  them  with  these,  is 
rather  important.  They  were  in  that  desk  of  his, 
too,  and  I  happened  to  know  it.  Say,  Cuthbert, 
could  Lightfoot  make  the  pass,  do  you  think?" 

"Yes.  Lightfoot  could  make  the  pass  if  any- 
body could,  but  he  could  not  do  the  rest  of  it, 
Ace." 

"Lightfoot  and  Ben  Taggart  could  make  it,  and 
take  Gaffney  with  them— and  lose  him  up  there." 

Cuthbert  leaned  forward  half  across  the  big  di- 
rectors' table,  towards  his  companion. 

"Ace,  you  know  as  well  as  I  do  that  Ben  Tag- 
gart ain't  the  man  to  do  that  business  in  Magi- 
cian, ' '  he  said,  impressively.  "He'd  ball  it  up  and 
sprag  it,  somehow,  when  he  got  over  there  and 
faced  that  slick  article  of  a  court  clerk  who'd  be 
askin'  him  a  lot  of  questions.  Sam  Sutherland 


A  PAIR  OF  SCHEMERS  31 

and  Dan  Randall  are  as  thick  as  flies  when  they 
get  together,  and  the  minute  that  Sutherland  sees 
Dan's  name  signed  to  those  deeds  he's  going  to  be 
suspicious,  if  there's  the  least  cause  for  suspicion. 
He's  bound  to  be  so,  anyhow,  so  long  as  you  ain't 
got  them  old  deeds  to  Randall,  to  show  him.  He'd 
never  suspect  a  thing  if  you  had  them.  But  we 
ain't  got  'em.  Randall's  got  'em.  That's  what. 
I  didn't  suppose  they  were  in  that  desk,  or  I'd 
never  let  him  get  away  with  it.  You  hear  me!  I 
reckon  when  you  decided  to  let  him  go,  and  made 
Ben  put  up  his  gun,  you  thought  you  had  schemed 
out  another  plan  to  get  'em— but  where  are  they? 
No,  sir-ree!  If  anybody  tries  that  fool  trip  across 
the  pass  to  Magician,  you're  the  one  that's  got  to 
do  it." 

Wadleigh  straightened  himself,  threw  back  his 
head,  unconsciously  squared  his  wide  shoulders, 
and  replied: 

"Then  I  will  do  it.  That  settles  it,  Cuthbert. 
I'll  get  there,  too.  Go  out,  now,  and  find  Ben,  and 
send  him  here  to  me.  Then  wake  up  Gaffney  and 
take  him  and  Lightfoot  to  Ben's  shack,  down  by 
the  tracks.  It's  the  safest  place.  You  tell  Light- 
foot  what  he's  got  to  do— to  take  me  over  the  pass. 
He  is  the  only  man  within  five  hundred  miles  of 
here  who's  got  any  dogs,  and  we  must  go  provi- 
sioned for  emergencies— anyhow  for  three  or  four 
days.  Nobody  knows  what  the  conditions  are, 
over  that  pass.  Don't  say  anything  to  Lightfoot 
about  Gaffney.  I'll  attend  to  that.  We'll  make 
it  appear,  afterward,  that  Gaffney  insisted  upon 
going,  and  the  fewer  that  know  the  real  truth 
about  it  the  better.  Now  find  Ben  and  send  him 


32  UP  AGAINST  IT 

here.  We'll  meet  you  down  at  his  shack  in  an 
hour.  Tell  Lightfoot  that  we'll  make  the  start  as 
soon  as  he's  ready,  and  that  he  gets  a  hundred  dol- 
lars for  the  job." 

Cuthbert  hesitated  for  a  moment.  Then  he 
turned  away  toward  the  door;  but  he  grumbled 
audibly  and  angrily  as  he  went:  "Well,  maybe 
you  can  do  it  in  the  night,  for  it  will  be  night  be- 
fore you  get  to  the  top  of  the  pass,  'cause  there's  a 
moon;  but  all  the  same  7  wouldn't  do  it,  not  for 
the  whole  damned  railroad;  not  me!!"  Then  he 
passed  outside  and  closed  the  door  after  him. 

A  moment  later,  it  opened  and  closed  again,  and 
Wadleigh,  thinking  that  Cuthbert  had  returned, 
raised  his  head  and  turned  toward  the  door. 

For  once  in  his  eventful  life  Ace  Wadleigh  was 
startled  out  of  his  composure. 

Dan  Randall  stood  in  the  middle  of  the  room, 
facing  him. 


CHAPTER  III 

The  Fake  Package 

Ace  Wadleigh  possessed  all  of  the  courage  that 
should  have  belonged  to  a  thoroughly  good  man— 
which  he  was  very  far  indeed  from  being.  His 
ready  acceptance  of  the  dangers  of  the  journey 
over  the  Lantowa  mountains  was  sufficient  proof 
of  that. 

He  had  seated  himself  at  his  own  desk  when 
Randall  entered  the  room.  He  remained  seated 
when  he  discovered  who  was  there,  although  he  be- 
lieved that  he  courted  serious  injury,  if  not  actual 
death,  by  doing  so.  He  understood,  perfectly 
well,  that  he  was  no  match  for  Randall,  physically. 
His  own  strength  was  greater  than  most  men's,  but 
Randall's  approached  the  phenomenal. 

"You  have  returned,"  Wadleigh  said,  coolly. 
"Why?" 

"I  came  merely  to  satisfy  myself  that  you  had 
broken  open  my  desk,  to  rob  it!  ...  My  God, 
Ace,  how  is  it  that  you  can  become,  all  in  a  mo- 
ment it  seems  to  me,  such  an  unmitigated  cur, 
and  scoundrel— and  thief?  An  hour  ago  I  would 
not  have  believed  it,  and  I'd  have  come  near  to 
killing  any  man  who  dared  to  suggest  it.  ... 

"I  see  that  you  choose  not  to  reply;  also  that  you 
elect  to  sit  very  still  indeed  upon  that  chair. 


34  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Probably  you  realize  that  I  am  keeping  my  hands 
from  your  throat  only  by  a  mighty  effort.  You 
had  best  sit  quiet.  A  single  move  by  you  might 
make  me  forget  myself.  And  you  were  my  friend! 
You!  .  .  .  What  did  you  tell  Joyce?  .  .  . 

"You'd  better  answer  me,  Ace,  when  I  speak  to 
you;  and  reply  to  questions  that  I  ask.  If  you 
don't,  I'll  make  you— so  answer  that  one." 

"You  have  not  seen  her  since  she  went  out?" 
Wadleigh  replied,  with  a  slight  smile. 

"No.  I  have  been  in  the  room  across  the  hall, 
waiting  till  you  were  alone." 

"And  you  have  not  heard " 

"I'm  neither  a  spy,  nor  an  eavesdropper,  Ace, 
What  did  you  tell  her?" 

"I  told  her  that  you  had  resigned;  that's  all. 
You  might  have  heard— you  must  have  heard— 
the  conversation.  That  part  of  it,  at  least,  took 
place  in  the  hall.  She  was  not  surprised.  You 
weren't  very  far  wrong  when  you  told  her  that  she 
should  know,  better  than  you,  why  your  own  stock 
was  voted  against  you.  It  isn't  your  own  stock, 
and  it  never  was  your  own  stock,  and  Joyce  Mait- 
land  did  not  mean  that  it  ever  would  be  yours  from 
the  moment  when  you  had  it  put  in  her  name. 
Now  you've  got  the  facts,  and  if  you  don't  like  my 
version  of  them,  go  and  ask  her— only  I  don't 
think  you'll  get  very  much  that  is  satisfactory  to 
you,  from  her,  now." 

Randall's  fingers  opened  and  closed,  and  opened 
again.  He  took  half  a  step  forward  toward  his 
tormentor,  and  withdrew  it  again. 

"It's  a  wonder  that  I  don't  kill  you,  Wad- 
leigh," he  said,  shortly;  and  if  the  truth  be  told 


THE  FAKE  PACKAGE  35 

Wadleigh  thought  so,  too.  But  he  was  a  man  who 
was  unafraid.  That  was  his  dominating  power: 
courage. 

"Go  to  Joyce  and  ask  her  about  it,  if  you  like," 
Wadleigh  bluffed.  "She  won't  hesitate  to  laugh 
at  you— not  now,  that  the  mask  is  off.  A  man 
who  is  living  under  a  false  name." 

Randall  interrupted  him  with  a  gesture.  He 
did  not  speak,  but  the  gesture  was  sufficient. 
Wadleigh  understood  it  was  safer  to  stop.  He 
realized  that  he  was  hovering  above  a  powder 
magazine  with  a  lighted  match  in  his  hand. 

"I'll  end  by  hurting  you  if  you  continue  in  that 
strain,"  Randall  said,  wearily,  and  he  passed  a 
hand  across  his  brow  as  if  to  brush  something 
aside  from  his  vision.  "I'm  trying  to  control  my- 
self so  that  I  won't;  but  you  must  not  taunt  me. 
You  never  in  your  life  faced  the  danger  that  con- 
fronts you  now,  Ace.  If  this  tension  on  my  tem- 
per should  snap,  you'd  be  in  eternity  in  two  min- 
utes. I'd  crush  the  breath  out  of  your  body  with 
these;"  and  he  held  out  his  hands  with  the  fin- 
gers of  them  bent  and  strained  and  threatening. 
"You  know  it,  too,  so  be  careful.  I'm  pleading 
for  myself  more  than  for  you— for  I  don't  want  to 
kill  you,  Wadleigh.  ...  I  have  killed  one  man, 
and  that  is  enough.  I  know  how  it  feels,  after- 
ward. .  .  .  Have  you  told  her,  that?"  He  bent 
forward,  slightly,  awaiting  the  relpy;  and  Wad- 
leigh hesitated.  He  had  not  told  her,  but  he  had 
refrained  from  it  only  because  he  was  afraid  to  do 
so,  believing  that  Joyce  would  not  be  able  to  hide 
her  knowledge  of  it;  but  he  wanted  Randall  to  be* 
lieve  that  Joyce  knew. 


36  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"No;  I  did  not  tell  her— but,  she  knows,"  he 
lied,  slowly;  or  believed  that  he  did  so.  He  was 
wary  and  watchful,  more  than  half  expecting  an 
attack  when  he  said  that.  But  it  did  not  come, 
and  he  went  on,  for  he  could  see  that  although 
Randall's  fingers  were  twitching,  that  now  the 
man  was  thinking  more  of  Joyce  than  of  him. 
"She  asked  me  about  it.  The  mysteries  concern- 
ing your  past  troubled  her.  She  pretended  that 
they  did  not,  but  they  did.  She  wrote  letters.  I 
don't  know  where,  or  to  whom;  but  she  wrote. 
And  she  received  answers.  Joyce  has  discovered 
that  Dan  Randall  spells  only  two  of  your  names, 
and  she  knows  what  the  last  one  is.  She  knows 

that  you  are  the  one  who No;  I  won't  say  it. 

She  knows  why  you  dropped  your  last  name,  and 
why  you  came  out  into  this  country.  Do  you  want 
me  to  go  on?"  Wadleigh  was  lying  glibly 
enough,  now. 

"Yes." 

"She  had  letters,  and  files  of  old  newspapers, 
sent  to  her,  and  when  she  had  mastered  the  con- 
tents, she  asked  me  about  them.  What  could  I 
say?  She  had  the  proofs.  What  was  the  good  of 
my  denying  it?  Any?  I  don't  see  it,  if  there 
was." 

"How  long  has  she  known  about  it?  Tell  me 
that." 

"How  should  I  know?  It  has  been  some  time, 
I  fancy.  She  sent  for  me  and  asked  me  about  it 
the  day  you  went  away,  two  weeks  ago.  Nobody 
expected  that  you  could  get  back  here,  after  the 
snow  came.  Nobody  could  have  done  it,  but  you. 
I  don't  know  how  you  did  it.  Any  other  man 


THE  FAKE  PACKAGE  37 

would  have  perished  in  that  storm,  yesterday,  but 
you  came  through  it." 

"And  it  never  occurred  to  you  that  I  would  do 
that,  did  it?"  Randall  exclaimed.  "You  didn't 
want  me  here.  You  thought  I  was  in  Carrolton, 
and  that  I  would  be  detained  there  indefinitely. 
You  banked  upon  my  being  absent  when  you  in- 
duced the  other  seven  thieves  to  join  you  here  to 
hold  that  snap  meeting  of  stockholders  and  direc- 
tors, to  put  me  out  of  business.  And  to  think  that 
I  came  because  I  believed  you  would  want  me, 
needed  me!  God,  Wadleigh,  it's  a  wonder  that  I 
don't  kill  you!!" 

Wadleigh  left  his  chair  and  stood  upon  his  feet. 
He  knew  that  the  paroxysm  of  Randall's  wrath 
was  past  now,  and  that  he  was  comparatively  safe 
from  his  former  chum.  He  took  the  advantage  of 
a  coward,  knowing  that  his  own  weakness  was  his 
strength. 

"Drop  that,  Dan,"  he  said.  "I'm  not  afraid  of 
you,  or  of  your  heroics.  There  won't  be  any  kill- 
ing done  here  to-day.  You're  out  of  the  company 
now,  and  we  don't  want  to  have  anything  more  to 
do  with  you.  The  stock  you  have  called  yours 
never  stood  in  your  name,  and  you  can't  prove  that 
you  ever  had  any  right  to  it.  Try  it  if  you  believe 
you  can." 

"Maybe  I  will  try  it,  Ace,  but  not  in  exactly  the 
way  you  think  I  will." 

"Try  it,  and  be  damned.  You  talked  with 
Joyce  Maitland  last  night  after  you  got  back  here, 
over  the  telephone.  Oh,  I  know  all  about  it.  It's 
a  pity  you  didn't  go  to  see  her  instead  of  calling 
her  up  on  the  'phone.  You'd  have  been  spared 


38  UP  AGAINST  IT 

some  of  the  things  that  have  happened  to-day— 
maybe;  anyhow,  you'd  have  known  about  them  a 
little  sooner.  Joyce  knows  who  you  are,  and  what 
you  are,  and  she  is  through  with  you.  You  could 
see  that  in  her  manner  here,  to-day,  couldn't  you? 
Now,  what  do  you  want?  What  did  you  come 
sneaking  back  here  for,  after  you  have  been  put 
out?" 

Randall  did  an  unexpected  thing,  then.  It  sur- 
prised even  himself,  he  was  so  cool  about  it. 

But  Wadleigh  had  gone  a  step  too  far;  and  Ran- 
dall knew  that  his  own  insane  rage  was  past,  and 
that  he  could  trust  himself  not  to  kill.  He  thrust 
out  his  hands  and  seized  Wadleigh 's  arms,  holding 
them  rigidly.  Then  he  drew  them  together  until 
he  could  clasp  both  of  the  new  president's  wrists 
with  the  fingers  of  one  of  his  own  hands.  He  held 
them  so,  and  Wadleigh  knew  how  utterly  futile  it 
would  be  to  struggle.  For  a  moment  the  man 
came  very  near  indeed  to  being  afraid,  although  he 
seemed  to  understand,  as  Randall  understood,  that 
he  would  not  be  killed. 

"I  came  here  to  make  certain  that  you  would 
break  into  my  desk,"  Randall  said,  speaking 
slowly.  '  'There  could  be  only  one  reason  why  you 
would  do  that— those  deeds  of  mine." 

"Well,  what  of  it?"   Wadleigh  was  still  bluffing. 

"You  knew  when  I  left  here  for  Carrolton  that 
I  went  to  Magician  first  because  I  wanted  to  get 
those  deeds.  They  are  in  my  name,  anyhow;  in 
Dan  Randall 's  name. ' '  » 

"The  Dominion  of  Canada  doesn't  take  kindly 
to  people  who  travel  under  fie " 

' '  Shut  up.    You  knew  that  I  brought  them  back 


THE  FAKE  PACKAGE  39 

with  me  last  night.  You  knew  that  I  had  not  put 
them  into  the  safe.  You  decided  that  they  were  in 
my  desk,  and  you  wanted  them.  But  why?  They 
have  been  recorded.  What  good  would  they  have 
done  you,  if  you  had  secured  them?" 

"I  haven't  said  that  I  wanted  them.  You're 
saying  it.  I  don't  want  them— as  you  will  find 
out  if  you  live  long  enough.  Let  go  of  me,  will 
you?" 

"I  will  when  I  have  finished  with  you— and  I'm 
pretty  nearly  through.  Come  over  here." 

With  his  one  hand  and  despite  the  known 
strength  of  Ace  Wadleigh,  Randall  pulled  him  eas- 
ily across  the  room  toward  a  row  of  hooks  fastened 
to  the  wall.  A  braided  leather  quirt  hung  from 
one  of  them.  Randall  took  it  down. 

"Ace,"  he  said,  with  deliberate  calmness,  "I'm 
going  to  give  you  the  worst  thrashing  you  ever 
had  in  your  life— with  this  quirt.  See  it?"  He 
raised  it  and  struck  Wadleigh  across  the  thighs. 
"Feel  it?" 

Ace  did  attempt  to  struggle,  then,  but  he  could 
not  escape,  and  the  cruel  quirt  fell  again  and 
again,  until  the  victim's  trousers  were  slashed  and 
rent,  and  the  blood  from  the  beaten  man's  legs 
showed  upon  them  in  several  places.  The  lash 
was  heavy  and  was  made  of  braided  rawhide.  The 
hand  of  the  man  who  wielded  it  was  heavier 
still. 

Nevertheless,  Wadleigh  uttered  no  sound  of 
lamentation.  He  was  game,  even  under  the  stress 
of  that  awful  punishment.  Most  men  would  have 
broken  down  and  confessed  under  such  a  terrible 
whipping,  but  he  did  not.  Many  would  have  cried 


40  UP  AGAINST  IT 

out  that  they  had  lied,  and  stolen,  and  misrepre- 
sented, and  deceived,  but  he  did  not.  Another 
might  have  admitted  that  Joyce  Maitland  was  in 
utter  ignorance  of  every  one  of  the  things  he  had 
said  she  knew  about,  but  Wadleigh  did  not  weaken. 

But  he  did  struggle,  and  strike  with  his  hands 
upon  the  iron-like  arms  of  Dan  Randall.  He  could 
not  reach  Randall's  face.  And  the  struggling  and 
the  scuffling  over  the  bare  floor  made  considerable 
noise,  so  that  Randall  did  not  know  that  the  door 
opened  and  that  Ben  Taggart  strode  into  the  room, 
and  halted,  amazed  by  what  he  saw. 

And  Wadleigh  pretended  not  to  know.  He  did 
not  want  to  do  anything  to  warn  Randall  of  what 
he  knew  must  happen  in  a  moment,  for  Ben  Tag- 
gart was  big  and  brutal,  and  was  almost  as  strong 
in  his  muscles  as  Randall. 

The  former  lumberjack  paused  only  an  instant. 
Then  he  went  swiftly  forward  with  the  silent  tread 
of  a  panther,  and  when  Randall  drew  back  the 
quirt  for  another  blow,  he  seized  it  and  tore  it 
from  Randall's  grasp,  turned  it  butt  foremost,  and 
struck  heavily,  even  as  Dan  was  in  the  act  of  turn- 
ing to  discover  what  had  interfered  with  him. 

The  butt  end  of  the  heavy  quirt  fell  on  the  side 
of  Randall's  head  just  above  his  left  ear,  and  he 
dropped  to  the  floor  like  an  ox  that  is  struck  by  a 
maul. 

Wadleigh,  in  a  frenzy  of  fury,  because  for  once 
in  his  life  he  was  quite  beside  himself,  sprang  for 
the  quirt  which  Taggart  threw  aside  as  soon  as 
Randall  fell,  and  he  raised  it  to  give  back  upon  the 
body  of  the  insensible  man  the  beating  he  had  re- 
ceived; but  Taggart  tore  it  from  his  grasp.  Then 


THE  FAKE  PACKAGE  41 

he  tossed  it  to  the  floor  beside  the  prostrate  form 
of  Dan  Randall. 

"That'll  do,"  he  said  harshly.  "You  can  save 
all  that  for  another  time.  There  ain't  any  to 
spare,  now.  You'd  better  change  your  clothes  and 
wash  up,  Ace.  You  certainly  do  look  some  rum- 
pled. Lightfoot  is  waiting'  for  us,  and  we've 
brought  that  bum  to  his  senses.  The  sled  is 
packed  and  the  dogs  harnessed.  I'm  goin'  with 
you,  so  get  a  move  on." 

Instead  of  doing  as  directed,  Wadleigh  dropped 
upon  his  knees  beside  Dan.  He  thrust  one  hand 
down  inside  of  the  leather  waistcoat  that  Randall 
wore,  and  pulled  it  out  again  containing  a  thickly 
filled  package  that  was  tied  with  tape. 

Feverishly,  for  him,  he  loosened  the  tape  and 
ran  the  contents  of  the  package  between  his  fin- 
gers. 

"The  deeds!"  he  exclaimed.  "Jove!  this  is 
luck." 

He  started  to  his  feet,  forgetful  of  the  lashing  he 
had  received,  and  darted  across  the  room  to  his 
own  desk,  where,  with  skill  and  rapidity,  he  made 
up  a  second  package  of  the  same  size  and  thickness 
as  the  one  he  had  stolen,  using  papers  of  his  own 
which  were  of  little  or  no  account,  and,  in  fact,  giv- 
ing small  heed  to  what  they  were. 

"What  the  blazes  are  you  up  to  now?"  de- 
manded Taggart,  who  was  watching  him. 

"Up  to,  man?  I've  got  the  original  deeds; 
don't  you  understand?  They  are  made  to  Ran- 
dall, from  the  original  conveyors.  All  the  deeds 
that  'we've  got  are  forged.  Sutherland,  who  has 
to  record  them,  is  Dan's  friend.  He'd  suspect  if 


42  UP  AGAINST  IT 

we  didn't  have  these;  but  when  we  show  him  all  of 
these,  and  tell  him  the  story  that  I  will  tell  him, 
he'll  record  them  without  a  murmur;  and  once  re- 
corded  " 

"But  what  are  you  doing  now,  that's  what  I 
want  to  know?" 

"I'm  putting  this  fake  package  into  his  pocket 
in  place  of  the  package  of  deeds.  It  is  the  same 
size  and  shape,  and  is  tied  in  the  same  wrapper, 
and  with  the  same  tape.  The  deeds  have  been  re- 
corded and  it  isn't  likely  that  he'll  undo  that 
package  again  for  weeks  to  come.  He'll  probably 
take  it  to  Judge  Grayson  and  ask  him  to  keep  it  in 
his  safe  for  him.  That  thrashing  was  the  luckiest 
thing  that  ever  happened  to  me.  Come  on,  now, 
for  I  want  to  get  out  of  here.  You  say  that  Light- 
foot  is  ready?" 

"Yes;  and  so's  the  bum." 

"And  you  are  going,  too?" 

"Surest  thing  you  know,  Ace.  You'd  never  get 
through  without  me;  and  that  Gaffney,  when  he's 
sober,  is  tougher  than  a  pine  knot.  He  might  turn 
on  you.  But  he  ain't  likely  to  do  much  turning  if 
I'm  along,"  he  added,  significantly. 

"Can  we  make  the  trip  to-night?" 

"We'll  make  it  by  some  time  to-morrow,  and 
that'll  be  time  enough,"  was  the  grim  reply. 
"That  is,  we  will  if  we  can  get  through  at  all.  If 
we're  held  up  by  the  snows,  there's  grub  enough 
for  us,  and  we'll  make  the  pass  sooner  or  later. 
One  thing  is  certain:  Nobody  else  can  get  to  Magi- 
cian before  we  do." 

"All  right.  You  go  on  down  to  your  shack. 
I'll  slip  around  to  my  quarters,  and  out  again  by 


THE  FAKE  PACKAGE  43 

the  back  way,  after  I've  made  ready  for  the  trip, 
it'll  be  cold  up  there  in  the  pass,  to-night.  Leave 
the  door  open  into  the  hall.  Let  Randall  think 
what  he  pleases  when  he  comes  to,  and  finds  that 
I  have  gone.  He'll  never  know  who  hit  him  un- 
less you  tell  him  of  it.  There  isn't  a  thing  here 
in  this  joint  that  I  care  a  fig  about,  now.  I've  got 
all  that' I  need  at  Carrolton.  We're  not  likely  to 
blow  back  here  for  two  weeks  or  more." 

"/  ain't  likely  to  blow  back  again  for  two 
months  or  more,  if  anybody  should  ask  you,"  said 
Taggart,  as  they  passed  together  from  the  office 
into  the  wide  hall,  "but  it's  a  cinch  that  you'll  be 
knocking  at  a  certain  door  in  this  town,  just  about 
as  soon  as  Rickett's  canyon  is  dug  open.  She's  a 
beaut,  all  right,  Ace,  and  I  don't  blame  you— only 
I  always  thought  she  liked  Dan  a  heap  better  than 
you.  But  maybe  I'm  wrong." 

Wadleigh  made  no  reply  to  Taggart 's  remarks. 
He  scarcely  paid  attention  to  them.  He  was 
thinking  rapidly  and  deeply. 

When  they  had  passed  beyond  the  storm-doors 
to  the  street  which  fronted  on  the  Square,  Wad- 
leigh gave  Taggart  a  second  package  which  he  had 
taken  from  his  own  desk  in  the  office. 

"On  your  way,  Ben,  leave  this  at  Miss  Mait- 
land's  door,"  he  said.  "If  you  should  happen  to 
see  her,  just  say  that  I  sent  it,  and  that  there  is  no 
answer;  if  you  do  not  see  her,  just  leave  it.  There 
are  things  inside  of  that  package  which  will  settle 
Dan  Randall's  hash  with  her,  for  good." 

They  parted,  going  in  opposite  directions. 


CHAPTER  IV 

Life— and  the  Right  to  Live 

A  moment  afterward  Joyce  Maitland  came  out 
of  a  store  at  the  opposite  side  of  the  square  and 
crossed  directly  toward  the  office  of  the  railroad 
company,  where  she  mounted  the  stairs.  It  was 
evident  that  she  had  not  seen  either  of  the  men  who 
had  just  come  out. 

She  was  surprised  when  she  arrived  at  the  top 
of  the  stairs  to  discover  that  the  office  door  was 
ajar,  and  she  went  rapidly  forward  to  it,  and 
passed  inside. 

For  an  instant  she  stopped,  and  her  hand  flew 
to  her  bosom  when  she  saw  Dan  Randall  prone 
upon  the  floor  in  front  of  her,  but  she  did  not  cry 
out;  she  only  faltered  and  then  went  swiftly  for- 
ward toward  him. 

Her  first  thought  was  that  he  was  dead,  but  even 
as  it  came  to  her,  he  moved. 

Then,  as  she  bent  forward  to  assist  him,  she 
tripped  over  the  quirt  on  the  floor,  and,  in  recover- 
ing, she  seized  it,  intending  merely  to  cast  it  aside 
out  of  the  way.  At  that  precise  instant  Randall 
sat  bolt  upright,  facing  her. 

One  glance  only  he  gave  her,  and  then  he  leaped 
to  his  feet  as  if  he  had  not  been  hurt  at  all.  Like  aU 
strong  men,  when  stricken  senseless,  he  recovered 


LIFE-AND  THE  RIGHT  TO  LIVE       45 

suddenly  and  completely.  He  was  in  full  posses- 
sion of  his  senses  the  instant  his  eyes  rested  upon 
Joyce  Maitland,  although  he  had  been  entirely  ig- 
norant of  her  nearness  until  then;  and  his  first  con- 
scious glance  had  discovered  her  bending  toward 
him  with  the  ugly  quirt,  butt  foremost,  in  her 
grasp,  and  with  her  face  pale  and  drawn  and 
frightened,  as  if  in  terror  of  what  she  had  done. 

' '  So ;  it  was  you ! "  he  said.  ' '  You  have  a  heavy 
hand,  Miss  Maitland." 

"Why  Dan " 

"That  quirt  is  mine,  if  you  please.  Give  it  to 
me.  You  might  take  the  notion  to  do  more  dam- 
age with  it." 

"Why,  Dan!  Dan!!  What  in  the  world  do  you 
mean?"  she  gasped,  falling  backward,  away  from 
him,  in  her  horror  of  comprehension  of  the  mean- 
ing of  his  words;  but  he  took  two  steps  toward  her 
and  received  the  quirt  from  her  unresisting  grasp. 
Then  he  looked  around  him  for  a  sign  of  Wad- 
leigh,  and  she  watched  him  in  amazement  so  utter 
that  it  was  silent.  She  could  not  speak. 

"Your  new  partner  has  disappeared,  Miss  Mait- 
land; and  now  that  you  know  all  about  me,  I  think 
you  had  better  follow  him.  I  have  killed  one  man, 
you  know,  and  an  utter  brute  like  me  might  even 
attack  a  woman.  At  least  you  might  think  I 
would;  you're  quite  capable  of  it.  ...  Oh,  you 
need  not  look  so  frightened.  I  wouldn't  really 
harm  you,  you  know;  but  I'll  tell  you  one  thing. 
It's  this:  I  don't  think  I've  quite  killed  Ace  Wad- 
leigh  to-day,  but  if  I  ever  hear  that  you  are  to  be 
his  wife,  I  will  do  it.  ...  There,  now;  there!  I'm 
in  an  ugly  mood,  and  you'd  better  go  while  there* 


46  UP  AGAINST  IT 

is  time.  If  you  remain,  I  might  be  tempted  to  tell 
you  how  utterly  I  loved  you  up  to  an  hour  ago— 
and  how  entirely  I  despise  you,  now.  The  door  is 
open.  .  .  .  Go,  please." 

She  went. 

Not  a  word  of  protest  did  she  utter  as  she  fled 
from  him  through  the  open  doorway  and  down  the 
stairs,  and  through  the  lower  hall  to  the  storm 
doors  and  into  the  street,  scarcely  knowing  what 
she  did. 

She  was  conscious  only  of  what  she  had  just  seen 
and  heard.  She  had  found  Dan  Randall  prone 
upon  the  floor,  and  he  had  roused  to  consciousness 
to  accuse  her  of  striking  him  down. 

As  she  went  on  toward  her  own  home,  flaming 
anger  began  to  blaze  in  her  eyes  and  to  heave  in 
her  breathing.  She  was  hurt,  wounded,  angry, 
mystified,  and  the  mixture  of  sensations  was  too 
much  for  her,  so  that  when  at  last  she  did  ar- 
rive at  her  home  she  went  straight  to  her  own1 
room  and  threw  herself  upon  the  bed,  and 
wept. 

Back  in  the  railroad  office,  Randall  found  Wad- 
leigh's  desk  open,  and  upon  it  was  a  forgotten  sin- 
gle sheet  of  paper  upon  which  Randall's  name,  as 
he  always  wrote  his  signature,  had  been  written 
and  rewritten  many  times.  Doubtless  it  had 
fallen  there  while  Wadleigh  was  searching  for 
papers  with  which  to  make  up  the  fake  package 
that  he  had  put  into  Dan's  pocket  to  replace  the 
packet  of  deeds  that  he  had  stolen. 

The  sight  of  it  brought  Randall  to  his  senses— 
to  his  saner  senses.  He  knew  that  Wadleigh 
could  not  have  written  those  signatures;  but  some- 


LIFE-AND  THE  RIGHT  TO  LIVE       47 

body  had  done  it,  and  it  had  been  done,  in  many 
instances,  nearly  perfectly. 

' '  Forgery ! "  he  muttered,  aloud.  ' '  Why ! !  The 
cut-off?  By  Jove!!  Those  old  deeds  that  Ace 
wanted!"  He  felt  quickly  at  his  breast,  drew  out 
the  faked  package,  breathed  a  sigh  of  relief  and 
returned  it.  Then  he  thought  on:  "They're  of  no 
value  in  themselves,  really,  now  that  they  are  re- 
corded; that  is— oh,  well,  I  worked  altogether  too 
hard  to  obtain  them,  to  wish  to  lose  them  now. 
.  .  .  But  what  does  this  mean?  What  are  they 
trying  to  forge,  with  my  name?  Deeds?  By ' ' 

He  stopped  right  there,  stood  like  a  statue  for  an 
instant,  and  then  rushed  from  the  building,  cram- 
ming the  sheet  of  foolscap  into  one  of  his  pockets 
as  he  went.  Although  he  slowed  down  his  pace 
when  he  was  in  the  street  in  order  to  avoid  at-' 
tracting  undue  attention  to  himself,  he  almost  ran, 
nevertheless,  and  he  did  not  pause  until  he  was 
ringing  the  old-fashioned  pull-bell  at  the  door  of 
the  house  where  Boniface  Wadleigh  lived,  and  was 
cared-for,  looked-after,  and  cooked-for  by  a 
French- Canadian  and  wife,  whom,  as  it  happened, 
Randall  had  recommended  to  his  friend  and  con- 
fidant more  than  a  year  before.  ...  It  had  hap- 
pened when  he  and  Wadleigh,  sworn  friends  and 
comrades,  had  gone  to  Janver  together,  deter- 
mined to  buy  up  for  "next  to  nothing"  the  assets, 
rolling  stock,  grades,  rights  of  way,  appurtenances, 
etc.,  etc.,  of  the  very  nearly  defunct  and  scarcely 
begun  Manitoba  &  Juneau  Railroad  Company. 

It  is  doubtful  if,  at  that  time,  Wadleigh  had 
clearly  understood  that  Jules  Legarde  had  served 
Randall  as  guide  and  companion  in  the  far  north 


48  UP  AGAINST  IT 

for  almost  a  year  when  Randall  fled  to  the  "silent 
places"  from  an  eastern  city.  He  might  not  have 
retained  the  services  of  Jules  and  his  wife,  other- 
wise. However,  it  was  Jules  Legarde  who  opened 
the  door  for  Randall  when  he  rang,  and  Jules, 
of  course,  knew  nothing  of  the  rupture  between 
his  present  master  and  his  former  employer. 

Jules  was  a  true  son  of  the  North,  with  a  quarter- 
strain  of  Indian  blood  in  his  veins.  He  loved  the 
wild  places  and  the  silences,  and  he  longed  for 
them  every  day  of  his  life,  contrasting  the  call  of 
them  day  by  day  with  his  great  love  for  Yvonne, 
who  had  consented  to  be  his  wife  only  on  condition 
that  he  give  up  forever  the  life  of  a  trapper.  And 
Jules  loved  Dan  Randall  with  a  dog-like  affection 
that  can  be  born  only  of  such  companionship  as 
they  had  shared  in  the  wild  places.  When  he  saw 
his  former  master  at  the  door  he  expressed  his  joy 
at  seeing  him  again,  much  as  a  faithful  dog  might 
have  done. 

But  his  quick  perceptions  discovered  that  some- 
thing was  wrong  with  his  beloved  "M'sieu." 

"I  want  Wadleigh,  Jules.  Where  is  he?"  was 
Randall's  abrupt  greeting. 

"Heem  gone,  m'sieu.  Heem  not  here.  .  .  . 
V'ere?  Je  na  sais  pas.  Heem  come  by  back 
door;  heem  go  same  vay.  For  sledge,  mebby, 
m'sieu.  Heem  put  on  furs.  Oui.  Thirt',  mebby 
forty  minutes  ago.  Voila!" 

For  a  moment  Randall  stared,  not  entirely  com- 
prehending. Then,  in  a  flash  it  came  to  him  that 
Wadleigh  might  have  fled  from  the  office  believ- 
ing that  Randall  had  been  killed. 

But  would  he  have  flown  for  such  a  thing? 


LIFE-AND  THE  RIGHT  TO  LIVE       49 

Hardly.  Wadleigh  had  never  been  one  to  be 
frightened.  What  then?  The  deeds?  The  sheet 
of  paper  containing  the  forged  signatures  of 
Randall?  There  was  something  there.  It  meant 
something,  but  what? 

He  seized  Jules  by  both  arms. 

"Listen  to  me,  Jules,"  he  said,  compelling  him- 
self to  patient  speaking.  He  realized  that  Jules' 
sense  of  loyalty  to  his  present  employer  would  de- 
mand a  reason  for  what  he  might  be  asked  to  do 
by  his  former  master.  "Wadleigh  and  I  have 
quarreled.  He  has  wronged  me.  Some  day  I  will 
explain.  Go,  now,  and  find  out  for  me  where  he 
has  gone,  and  with  whom  he  has  gone.  Return 
quickly.  I  will  wait  here.  But  be  quick.  I  will 
wait  for  you  in  his  sitting  room." 

Randall  entered  the  room  which  Wadleigh 
called  home,  in  Janver,  and  closed  the  door  after 
him.  He  stared  around  him  at  the  confusion  of 
things  scattered  about  the  room,  and  at  the  clearv 
evidences  of  a  hasty  departure.  Then  he  began 
to  pick  up  one  article  after  another,  and  examine 
them,  and  at  last,  putting  aside  his  scruples  against 
that  sort  of  spying,  and  realizing  that  the  end 
justified  the  means— and  having  already  discov- 
ered enough  to  know  that  the  end  would  justify 
his  acts— he  seated  himself  upon  the  chair  before 
Wadleigh 's  open  desk.  But  even  then  he  swung 
the  chair  around  until  he  faced  the  other  way,  and 
made  no  effort  to  examine  it. 

He  was  still  there  when  Jules  announced  his  re- 
turn by  a  timid  knock  upon  the  door,  half  an  hour 
later. 

"Heeni  gone  with  Lightfoot  an'  m'sieu  Tag- 


50  UP  AGAINST  IT 

garrr,"  he  announced  without  preface.  "Heem 
take  stranger,  too— a  m'sieu  Gaffney.  Ovair  the 
Lantowa,  by  the  pass,  mebby.  I  do  not  know  dat. 
If  eet  ees  so,  they  freeze,  mebby.  Eet  is  ver'  cold 
up  dere,  m'sieu." 

Randall  started  to  his  feet. 

He  was  a  tall  man  and  he  towered  high  above 
the  quarter-breed.  He  rested  his  hands  heavily 
upon  the  shoulders  of  Jules,  and  said: 

"My  friend,  you  must  find  a  way  to  take  me  over 
the  pass  to-night,  too.  Can  you  do  it?  I  know 
that  you  can;  and  you  must.  The  wires  are  down, 
and  so  I  must  go.  Tell  nobody  but  Yvonne,  and 
warn  her  to  tell  nobody.  How  soon  can  you  meet 
me  at  White  Lake,  and  be  prepared?"  He  never 
thought  of  questioning  the  willingness  or  the  abil- 
ity of  Jules  Legarde  to  do  what  he  had  asked,  nor 
did  Jules  hesitate  in  his  reply. 

"One,  two,  mebby  free  hours,  m'sieu.  I  weel 
be  dere,  tout-a-fait.  But,  remember,  m'sieu,  eet 
ees  cold;  ver'  cold,  in  the  pass.  Mooch  furs  you 
weel  need,  certainment." 

Randall  nodded  his  head,  removed  his  hands 
from  Jules'  shoulders  and  started  for  the  door; 
but  he  paused  midway  and  thrust  a  hand  inside 
his  leather  waistcoat,  drawing  forth  the  faked 
package  that  Wadleigh  had  replaced  there  after 
he  had  stolen  the  original  contents  of  it. 

"I  shall  not  return  to  the  square,  Jules,"  he  said. 
"You  will  have  to  pass  that  way.  Take  this  to 
Judge  Grayson,  ask  him  to  put  it  in  his  safe,  and 
keep  it  for  me.  But  wait.  Let  me  be  sure " 

He  slipped  the  tape  off,  unrolled  it  and  laid  bare1 
the  false  papers  it  contained.  Then  stood  quite 


LIFE-AND  THE  RIGHT  TO  LIVE       51 

still,  staring.  At  last,  without  a  word,  he 
wrapped  up  the  packet  again,  replaced  the  tape 
and  restored  the  whole  to  his  pocket.  Then  he 
spoke,  but  the  words  were  addressed  to  himself, 
rather  than  to  his  companion.  He  said: 

"Robbed!  My  deeds  stolen  while  I  was  insen- 
sible. And  Joyce  knew— she  must  have  known. 
Perhaps  it  was  done  with  her  approval.  God!! 
.  .  .  Go,  Jules.  Meet  me  at  the  stone  house,  at 
White  Lake.  We  will  have  a  night  of  toil  ahead 
of  us;  a  night  of  intense  cold.  But  we  must  fight 
Death,  in  order  to  win  Life,  my  friend.  Life,  and 
the  right  to  live." 


CHAPTER  V 
A  Declaration  of  War 

"Life,  and  the  right  to  live!" 

The  quarter-breed  felt,  rather  than  understood, 
the  significance  of  the  words  that  Dan  Randall  had 
used  in  bidding  him  begone. 

He  stopped  near  the  door  and  looked  back.! 
Randall  had  turned  away,  and  was  staring  through 
the  window  at  nothing.  Jules  nodded  his  head 
twice,  sagely,  contracted  his  massive  chest  and 
shoulders  in  a  significant  shrug,  then  went  softly 
to  his  beloved  master  again  and  touched  him  ten- 
tatively upon  the  arm. 

Dan  started,  and  turned  swiftly,  and  seeing  that 
it  was  Jules  who  had  touched  him,  he  smiled. 
That  quick  smile  was  an  expression  of  affection 
and  confidence  that  is  the  result  of  absolute  knowl- 
edge. It  exists  between  men  only  when  they  have 
faced  death  together  many  times,  and  in  many 
forms,  and  have  lived  together  among  the  soli- 
tudes, and  amid  the  vast  spaces,  and  mysterious, 
endless  distances. 

"What  is  it,  Jules?"  he  asked,  and  reached  out 
and  rested  a  hand  upon  the  quarter-breed's  shoul- 
der. 

"I  know,"  was  the  low-toned  reply,  and  Dan 
understood  that  Jules  referred  to  the  present  diffi- 


A  DECLARATION  OF  WAR  53 

culties;  that  somehow  the  man  knew  more  about 
them,  or  suspected  more,  than  was  apparent. 
"Een  one  minute  I  go.  Bimeby,  you  meet  me  at 
the  stone  house  near  the  lac.  C'est  bon.  But,  I 
have  thees  to  say,  m'sieu.  Dose  be  ver'  bad  men. 
I  know.  M'sieu  Wadleigh,  heem  worst  of  all,  be- 
cause heem  not  true.  Heem  mak'  the  lie  all  the 
time.  Heem  live  the  lie.  Just  now  they  all  down 
at  the  cabin  of  m'sieu  Tagarrr.  I  theenk  so, 
m'sieu.  Anyhow  I  go  dat  way.  But,  you  tell 
Jules  this.  Has  le  m'sieu  Wadleigh  try  to  steal 
the  railroad  from  m'sieu?  Non?  I  suspect.  I  not 
know.  You  tell  to  me,  eef  that  be  so. ' ' 

"Yes,  Jules.  He  has  stolen  it  already— or 
thinks  he  has." 

"Heem,  an'  dose  othairs?    Tell  me  that?" 

"Yes." 

"Bon,"  said  Jules,  with  an  emphatic  nod  of  his 
head.  "They  not  get  it;  non.  Merci,  m'sieu.  I 
go  now.  Bimeby  you  come  too.  I  be  ready." 
And  he  passed  from  the  room,  closing  the  door 
after  him.  Yvonne,  his  wife,  waited  in  the  ad- 
joining room. 

Randall,  left  to  himself,  quickly  recovered  his 
poise.  In  the  interval  that  followed  after  Jules 
went  from  the  room,  he  thought  deeply,  and  he 
tried  to  think  logically. 

The  right-of-way  across  the  Lantowa  mountain 
range,  over  and  along  Magician  pass,  belonged  to 
him  by  right  of  purchase,  had  been  paid  for  with 
his  own  money,  and  it  must  not  be  wrested  from 
him  by  fraud,  by  forgery,  or  by  force.  He  would 
fight  every  inch  of  the  way,  he  would  face  what- 
ever opposition  might  be  brought  against  him,  no 


54  UP  AGAINST  IT 

matter  what  the  odds,  he  would  confront  cunning 
with  cunning,  and,  if  necessary,  force  with  force. 

A  map  that  he  had  made  with  his  own  hands 
hung  against  the  wall  above  Wadleigh's  desk,  and 
he  crossed  the  room,  tore  it  from  its  fastenings, 
and  laid  it  open  upon  the  table. 

He  rested  a  finger  upon  the  spot  which  indicated 
Janyer;  he  touched  his  thumb  to  the  point  where 
Magician  was  located,  across  the  mountain,  in  the 
valley  beyond  it;  an  insignificant  distance  as  com- 
pared with  the  line  of  the  present  railroad  which 
he  followed  with  his  eyes  upon  the  map. 

The  existing  railroad  wound  and  twisted  its 
sinuous  way  for  many  miles  up  the  valley,  until 
it  could  find  a  tortuous  course  through  Rickett's 
canyon,  now  impassably  blocked  with  snow,  and 
thence,  like  a  running  snake,  it  glided  in  many 
loops  and  curves  down  the  other  side  of  the  moun- 
tains to  Magician. 

The  route  was  like  an  inverted  letter  U,  with 
Janver  at  one  end  of  it,  and  Magician  at  the  other. 
The  space  between  Randall's  thumb  and  finger, 
where  they  rested  upon  the  map,  was  merely  the 
distance  straight  across  between  those  two  points 
—but  it  was  across  the  Lantowa  mountains  by 
Magician  pass,  and  it  would  be  both  difficult  and 
costly,  as  well  as  dangerous,  to  build  a  railroad 
there. 

Then,  without  removing  his  hand  from  the  map, 
he  dropped  the  end  of  his  little  finger  upon  a  dot 
which  represented  the  thriving  town  of  Allerton, 
twice  as  far  toward  the  west,  as  Magician  was 
toward  the  east,  from  Janver.  Allerton  was  on 
the  line  of  the  Pacific  &  Hudson  Bay  railroad, 


A  DECLARATION  OF  WAR  55 

which  from  there  made  a  long  detour  toward  the 
south  and  east,  around  the  southern  spur  of  the 
Badger  mountains,  and  thence  northeasterly,  to 
Lonecamp,  which  was  forty  miles  south  of  Magi- 
cian. From  Carrolton,  which  was  the  present 
western  terminal  of  the  Manitoba  &  Juneau  rail- 
road, to  Allerton,  on  the  line  of  the  P.  &  H.  B.,  a 
distance  of  sixty  miles,  Randall  had  intended  to 
extend  his  own  road.  The  two  places  were  now 
connected  by  stagecoach.  The  contemplated  ex- 
tension from  Carrolton  to  Allerton  would  give  the 
M.  &  J.  a  splendid  connection  from  the  west.  But 
the  loop  thus  made  around  the  northern  end  of  the 
Badger  range,  by  way  of  Carrolton,  to  Allerton, 
would  be  almost  as  tortuous,  and  much  longer, 
than  the  loop  through  Rickett's  canyon,  between 
Janver  and  Magician.  And  as  he  looked  upon  the 
map  before  him,  he  instantly  saw  a  way  by  which 
both  the  difficulties  could  be  overcome.  He  dis- 
covered a  method  by  which  he  could  render  the 
present  line  of  the  Manitoba  &  Juneau  railroad, 
which  Wadleigh,  Taggart,  and  the  others,  had 
stolen  from  him,  practically  worthless.  If  a  rail- 
road could  be  built  over  Magician  pass,  then  why 
not  construct  another  one  through  the  Badger 
range,  by  way  of  the  Black  gorge?  He  smiled, 
folded  the  map,  and  put  it  in  his  pocket. 

Randall  raised  his  head,  still  smiling,  and  a  pho- 
tograph of  Wadleigh  stared  at  him  from  the  op- 
posite side  of  the  room.  He  scowled,  and  then 
banged  his  fist  down  upon  the  table,  replying 
aloud  to  the  insolent  stare  in  the  pictured  face. 

"I'll  beat  you  to  it,  Ace,  as  surely  as  I've  got 
muscles  to  work  with,  and  brains  to  direct  them," 


56  UP  AGAINST  IT 

he  said.  "I'll  beat  you  to  it,  and  I'll  fight  every 
inch  of  the  way  with  every  weapon  that  you  use, 
dollars,  fists  or  guns.  I'll  fight  every  one  of  your 
bunch  of  thieves  to  a  knockout  finish,  and  until 
you  haven't  a  frazzled  fringe  left  for  a  foothold." 

He  raised  his  clenched  fist  and  shook  it,  and 
added: 

"And  I  will  win,  too." 


CHAPTER  VI 

With  Dog-Like  Devotion 

Jules  Legarde,  product  of  the  silent  places  and 
the  mysterious  distances,  was  simple-minded, 
faithful,  honest  and  true.  He  did  not  lie,  he  had 
never  stolen,  and  he  was  utterly  ignorant  of  the 
arts  of  deception  as  they  are  practiced  in  civilized 
communities.  All  his  life,  since  Yvonne  was  a 
child  and  had  been  left  as  a  charge  upon  him  by 
her  father,  who  had  been  alike  his  mentor  and 
teacher  in  the  great  white  spaces,  Jules  had  toiled 
for  her.  She  had  been  his  religion  and  the  goal  of 
his  ambitions.  When  she  grew  to  womanhood, 
and  was  ready  for  the  wifehood  for  which  Jules 
had  waited  so  patiently,  she  had  no  thought  of  de- 
nying him.  But  she  did  make  it  a  condition  of 
their  marriage  that  he  should  forsake  the  life  of 
a  trapper,  and  Jules  had  harbored  no  mental  res- 
ervation in  the  promise  he  then  made  to  her. 

But,  although  he  could  abandon  the  north,  the 
solitudes,  the  snows,  and  the  dangers  that  beck- 
oned to  him,  he  did  not  and  could  not  give  up  his 
longings  for  them;  and  Yvonne  knew  that  he  did 
not.  She  gave  her  silent  approval  to  his  unspoken 
plan  of  retaining  his  well-trained  huskies,  and  she 
knew  (and  said  not  a  word  about  it)  that  as  soon 
as  the  snows  came,  he  loved  to  steal  away  from  his 
home  for  a  day,  or  two,  or  three  days  at  a  time  to 


58  UP  AGAINST  IT 

pass  the  interval  with  his  dogs,  and  amid  the  si- 
lences. She  knew  of  the  secret  place  over  near 
White  Lake  where  he  kept  the  dogs  hidden  away 
from  prying  eyes  and  curious  tongues.  They  were 
the  one  remaining  link  between  him  and  the  life 
he  had  loved— but  which  he  would  have  aban- 
doned over  and  over  again  for  love  of  her. 

The  year  that  Jules  had  passed  among  the  dis- 
tances as  guide  and  companion  to  Dan  Randall  had 
been  the  last  of  his  absences.  After  that,  he  and 
Yvonne  were  married,  and  it  had  been  Dan's  gen- 
erosity that  had  made  their  marriage  possible  so 
soon.  Thus  there  was  an  added  tie  to  bind  the  af- 
fections of  both  to  Dan.  If  Jules  saw  Deity  and 
worshipped  God  through  the  eyes  and  soul  of 
Yvonne,  Dan  Randall  came  next  in  his  regard. 

To  Yvonne,  Dan  was  ' '  The  M ' sieu. ' '  When  she 
made  use  of  the  the  title  she  uttered  it  reverently. 
Her  belief  in  him  was  unbounded;  her  devotion 
was  absolute— and  she  loved  Jules  none  the  less 
in  that  she  so  worshipped  Dan.  Jules  was  an  insti- 
tution. He  belonged  to  her;  was  father  and  broth- 
er to  her,  as  well  as  her  husband. 

But  in  her  reverential  soul,  and  in  every  throb 
of  her  loyal  heart,  she  adored  Dan  Randall,  and 
she  did  not  in  the  least  know  that  she  did  so.  For 
no  human  woman  could  have  been  purer,  and  gen- 
tler, and  truer,  in  every  thought  and  act  and  hope, 
than  Yvonne  Legarde.  It  was  never  passion  that 
she  felt  for  Randall.  It  was  adoration.  And 
she,  unsoiled  spirit  that  she  was,  would  not  have 
known  the  meaning  of  either  word,  and  would  not 
have  cared  to  differentiate  between  them  had  she 
been  told. 


WITH  DOG-LIKE  DEVOTION  59 

So,  when  Jules,  in  passing  from  the  house  to 
do  Randall's  bidding,  said  to  her  in  his  simple, 
straightforward  way,  "M'sieu,  he  have  need  of 
me.  We  cross  Lantowa  by  the  pass,  to-night.  Eet 
ees  for  m'sieu,  a  last  resort.  M'sieu  Wadleigh 
have  heem  offend.  How?  Je  ne  sais  pas.  We 
go  by  the  Magician  pass.  You,  Yvonne,  are  not 
to  tell,"  she  merely  nodded  her  pretty  head  in  ac- 
quiescence. Then,  while  he  was  hastily  collecting 
articles  here  and  there  to  take  with  him,  she  be- 
thought herself,  not  of  the  dangers  to  be  encoun- 
tered, but  of  the  difficulties,  and  asked: 

"But,  Jules,  can  you  cross  by  the  pass,  to-night, 
do  you  think?" 

"Eet  ees  fait  accompli,"  he  answered,  and 
passed  out  at  the  door. 

Yvonne  nodded  her  pretty  head,  and  seated 
herself  on  the  edge  of  a  chair,  to  think.  It  was 
indeed  as  good  as  done  to  cross  Lantowa  moun- 
tains by  Magician  pass  in  the  dead  of  winter  and 
so  soon  after  the  storm,  since  M'sieu  willed  it, 
and  Jules  said  it. 

She  started  hastily  to  her  feet  when,  a  few  min- 
utes later,  a  door  opened  and  Randall  appeared 
at  the  threshold. 

"M'sieu,"  she  said,  quickly,  and  courtesied  with 
natural  grace.  The  warm  blood  leaped  in  her 
veins  and  dyed  throat  and  cheeks  and  brow,  al- 
though she  was  unconscious  of  it. 

"Jules  has  gone?"  Dan  asked  her,  glancing 
about  the  neatly  kept  room. 

"Yes,  m'sieu." 

"Did  he  tell  you  where  we  are  going,  Yvonne?" 

"Across  the  mountain  by  the  pass.  Yes,  m'sieu. 


60  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Eet  will  be  ver'  bad  ovair  the  pass  thees  night. 
Will  ms'ieu  be  seated?" 

"No;  thank  you.  I  must  be  on  my  way.  If  by 
any  chance  Mr.  Wadleigh  should  return  here,  you 
are  not  to  tell  him  that  I  have  gone  away, 
Yvonne." 

"No,  m'sieu." 

"I  have  been  losing  my  friends  to-day,  little 
one,"  he  said,  stepping  forward  and  taking  both 
her  hands  in  his  and  looking  down  upon  her  with 
his  whimsical,  kindly  smile.  She  was  twenty 
years  younger  than  Jules,  and  nearly  five  years 
his  own  junior,  and  he  felt  toward  her  as  if  she 
were  a  child.  "But  I  still  have  you— you  and 
Jules." 

"Yes,  m'sieu.  Toujours— forever,"  she  replied 
with  an  emphasis  that  flashed  in  her  darkly  bril- 
liant eyes. 

"Thank  you,"  he  said,  knowing  that  the  reply 
was  sincere.  "Are  you  quite  willing  that  I  shall 
take  Jules  across  the  mountain  with  me  to-night? 
.  .  .  that  I  shall  take  him  away  from  you?" 

"Jules  is  yours— as  I  am,  m'sieu,"  she  replied, 
simply.  She  would  have  thought  nothing  of  start- 
ing upon  that  wild  journey  with  him,  herself,  had 
he  called  upon  her  to  do  so. 

"I  shall  not  live  in  Janver  again,  Yvonne;  not 
for  the  present,"  he  said,  releasing  her  hands  and 
retreating  to  the  shelf,  where  he  rested  one  arm 
upon  it.  And  then  he  added,  hastily:  "Don't  look 
so  frightened.  I  am  not  going  away.  Only,  I 
shall  not  live  in  the  town.  I  have  been  thinking, 
while  I  waited  in  that  other  room  for  the  time  to 
pass,  where  I  would  live.  There  are  reasons  why 


WITH  DOG-LIKE  DEVOTION  61 

I  shall  not  care  to  remain  in  Janver,  and  yet  I 
must  be  near.  ...  Do  you  know  of  the  little 
stone  house  beyond  White  Lake  that  is  built  into 
the  side  of  the  mountain  near  the  entrance  to  the 
pass?  It  is  there  Jules  keeps  his  dogs,  and  where 
he  hides  himself  away,  sometimes." 

"Yes,  m'sieu.  I  have  been  there  when  Jules 
did  not  know  it,  to  mak'  it  clean  for  heem  when 
he  should  go  again."  She  spoke  with  a  fascin- 
ating touch  of  accent,  and  her  English  was  usually 
very  good.  But  there  were  times  when  she  lapsed 
into  the  polyglot  of  her  husband,  who  mixed 
French,  English  and  Indian  together  with  de- 
lightful unconcern. 

'  'I  shall  go  there  to  live,  when  I  return.  I  shall 
move  all  of  my  things  over  there  as  soon  as  it  is 
possible."  He  sighed.  "I  wish  they  were  there 
now,  and  that  you  were  my  little  housekeeper, 
with  good  old  Jules  to  look  after  and  watch  over 
us  both."  He  smiled  down  upon  her. 

"Yes,"  she  said,  and  did  not  'smile.  "Eet 
would  be  —  nice,  m'sieu,"  she  added,  and 
looked  up  quickly  at  him  with  an  unasked  ques- 
tion in  her  eyes.  "Eet  ees— as  good  as  done," 
she  concluded,  smiling  at  him.  The  unasked  ques- 
tion had  been  answered  in  her  own  thought,  and 
already  she  had  determined  what  she  would  do 
while  the  m'sieu  was  absent. 

"I  shall  need  you  both,"  Randall  went  on,  "to 
take  care  of  me,  and  to  help  me  in  all  that  I  will 
have  to  do.  I  would  be  alone,  indeed,  without 
you  and  Jules  to  stand  by  me,  just  now.  And  the 
stone  house  will  be  just  the  place  for  me,  because 
it  is  so  near  to  the  pass.  As  soon  as  the  snow 


62  UP  AGAINST  IT 

melts,  and  disappears,  I  shall  be  very  busy. 
Would  you  like  to  live  there  "with  Jules  and  me, 
little  one?" 

"Yes,  m'sieu." 

"Perhaps  it  is  not  right  for  me  to  take  you 
away  from  Mr.  Wadleigh,  but  he  has  little  need 
of  you  now,  and  I  will  have  much.  I  doubt  if  he 
would  wish  to  keep  you  on,  anyway,  knowing,  as 
he  does,  that  both  of  you  are  my  good  friends,  and 
will  remain  so.  You  will  not  feel  sorry  to  leave 
him,  and  to  come  to  me?" 

"No,  m'sieu.  He  ees  not  good,  like  you.  He 
ees  bad.  He  has  bad  thoughts,  like  the  wolves, 
when  the  snow  is  deep  and  the  game  is  scarce. 
See;  when  Jules  is  not  here,  and  I  am  alone  in 
the  house  with  m'sieu  Wadleigh,  I  keep  this"— 
she*  pulled  one  of  the  smallest  of  the  hunting; 
knives  that  Jules  used,  from  its  sheath,  and 
showed  it  to  him,  and  as  she  returned  it  to  its 
hiding  place,  she  added:  "Twice,  m'sieu,  I  have 
had  to  hold  it  in  my  hand  when  he  has  talked  to 
me." 

Dan  merely  nodded.  He  understood,  but  he 
chose  not  to  manifest  more  than  his  approval  of 
her  attitude. 

"There  is  something  that  I  want  you  to  do  for 
me,  and  at  once,  Yvonne,"  he  said,  and  held  out  a 
key  toward  her.  "You  know  the  small  leather 
trunk  that  is  mine?  It  is  in  the  corner  of  my 
room,  near  the  bed,  at  Judge  Grayson's  house,  on 
the  Square.  Get  it,  and  hide  it  away  somewhere 
—no  matter  where.  Mr.  Wadleigh  might  seek  to 
get  possession  of  it.  The  judge  might  let  him  take 
it  away.  Bring  it  here,  if  you  like,  temporarily. 


WITH  DOG-LIKE  DEVOTION  63 

Only  do  not  leave  it  there.  My  very  life,  or  more, 
might  some  day  depend  upon  the  contents  of  that 
trunk.  You  will  get  it,  and  hide  it  for  me?  I 
shall  not  have  time." 

"Yes,  m'sieu,"  she  replied,  with  quiet  emphasis. 

"Behind  the  trunk  is  a  large  roll  of  papers— 
they  are  maps,  and  tracings,  and  blue-prints;  I 
shall  want  them,  also.  On  the  shelf  in  the  closet, 
there  is  a  locked  tin  box.  Care  for  that,  too.  The 
other  things,  the  books,  and  all  that,  you  can  leave 
where  they  are  until  I  return— or  until  Jules  shall 
return  without  me  in  case  I  am  detained.  I  will 
have  no  friends  here,  after  to-day,  but  you  and 
Jules.  I  tell  you  of  it  because  I  want  you  to 
understand  how  thoroughly  I  must  rely  upon  you 
both.  Remember,  you  are  to  tell  nobody  where  I 
have  gone." 

"Not  mademoiselle  Joie,  m'sieu?  (Yvonne  could 
never  quite  master  the  name  of  Joyce,  but  hitherto 
the  French  word  for  joy  had  seemed  to  fit  in  with 
her  ideas  of  Miss  Maitland,  and  she  invariably 
called  her  so.) 

"Miss  Maitland  least  of  all,"  was  the  quick  re- 
sponse, and  Dan  swung  upon  his  heels  ancl  left  the 
house  without  a  backward  glance.  The  introduc- 
tion of  Joyce's  name,  and  the  thought  that  she 
would  not  care  whither  he  had  gone,  quenched  for 
the  moment  all  thought  of  his  other  affairs;  the 
maps,  and  blue-prints,  and  papers,  and  the  con- 
tents of  the  leather  trunk. 


CHAPTER  VH 

Randall's  Renunciation 

White  Lake,  across  which  was  the  appointed 
rendezvous  with  Jules,  was  nearly  eight  miles 
away  by  the  traveled  road,  which  followed  the 
course  of  the  railway  for  part  of  the  distance;  but 
it  was  somewhat  less  than  half  that  distance  if  one 
chose  the  short  cut  over  the  ridge  and  across  the 
river  at  the  opposite  side  of  it,  which  was  now 
frozen  solid.  The  stone  house  to  which  Dan  had 
referred  in  his  talk  with  Yvonne,  was  beyond  the 
lake,  and  above  it— a  mile,  more  or  less,  south  of 
the  entrance  to  Magician  pass. 

Dan  seized  upon  an  extra  pair  of  snowshoes  that 
belonged  to  Jules,  and  carried  them  in  his  hands 
until  he  was  well  outside  of  the  town.  He 
stopped  to  adjust  them  when  he  was  close  to  the 
top  of  the  ridge,  for  he  well  knew  that  there  were 
treacherous  spots  in  the  flinty  crust  on  the  snow. 

The  wind  was  blowing  half  a  gale  and  the  air 
was  bitterly  cold,  but  Dan  was  accustomed  to 
that  and  minded  it  not  at  all,  although  he  did  pass 
around  to  the  lee  side  of  a  boulder  while  he  fas- 
tened the  snowshoes  to  his  feet.  When  he  raised 
his  head  after  he  had  finished  with  the  rawhide 
thongs,  he  was  facing  Janver.  Directly  in  the  line 
of  his  vision  was  the  house  in  which  Joyce  Mait- 


RANDALL'S  RENUNCIATION  65 

land  lived,  the  largest  and  the  most  pretentious 
one  in  the  town. 

Randall  stiffened  in  his  tracks  at  the  sight  of  it, 
and  with  the  thought  of  all  that  the  four  walls  of 
it  inclosed. 

His  dead  and  buried  hopes  were  there  in  the  per- 
son  of  Joyce  Maitland.  She  had  been  the  incen- 
itive  of  all  of  his  ambitious  hopes  and  aims  that 
had  come  to  life  again,  through  her,  after  his  re- 
turn from  that  year  among  the  solitudes  of  the 
frozen  north  with  only  Jules  Legarde  for  a  com- 
panion and  friend. 

It  all  came  back  to  him  while  he  stood  there 
gazing  across  the  bleak  and  desolate  waste  of/ 
crust-bound  snow  that  intervened  between  it  and 
him.  He  had  not  meant  to  return  to  civilization 
when,  with  Jules,  he  had  made  his  way  out  from 
the  Great  Slave  and  Great  Bear  lake  country  to 
obtain  new  supplies,  and  in  order  that  Jules  might 
ascertain  that  all  was  well  with  his  ward  ancb 
charge,  Yvonne. 

"Some  day,  mabby,"  Jules  had  told  him  then, 
"la  petite  Yvonne  she  say  she  will  marry  me;  dat 
is  what  her  papa  say  he  want,  when  he  die  in  my 
arms  eight  years  ago.  She  was  leetle  mademoi- 
selle, den— ssso  high.  Now,  she  is  w'at  you  call 
un  young  lady;  she  have  growed  up.  She  have 
been  to  school  with  the  factor  at  de  post,  an'  now 
she  at  Janver,  where  she  have  learned  all  they  can 
teach,  an'  I  know  dat  she  wait  for  me  to  be  my 
good  wife,  like  her  papa  want  her  to  be.  He  was 
my  friend,  just  de  same  age  as  me,  m'sieu,  so  la 
petite  Yvonne  she  is  like  she  was  my  own  leetle 
girl.  But,  it  is  bettair  dat  she  marry  me— Jules— 


66  UP  AGAINST  IT 

who  is  old  enough  to  be  her  papa,  than  she  tak* 
up  weeth  somme  bad  young  man  like  dose  fellers 
in  de  settlements.  ...  So,  m'sieu,  we  go  out,  now. 
We  will  go  far  to  the  south— to  Janver,  in  Sas- 
katchewan, where  Yvonne  waits  for  me.  I  will 
give  her  the  money*you  pay  to  me,  and  den  I  come 
back  into  de  north  with  you,  m'sieu,  for  un  more 
year— an'  then,  mabby,  I  have  earned  enough." 

That  was  why  Dan  Randall  had  ventured  as  far 
south  as  Janver,  but  with  no  intention  whatever 
of  remaining  longer  than  was  necessary  to  see 
Jules  married  to  his  Yvonne,  for  he  had  already 
decided  in  his  own  mind  that  the  two  shouldtnot 
be  compelled  to  wait  another  year  or  more  because 
of  the  need  of  sufficient  money  to  wed. 

Then,  Chance,  or  Fate,  Destiny  or  Circumstance 
—whatever  one  may  please  to  call  it— had  inter- 
vened in  Dan  Randall's  plans.  Winter,  very 
much  earlier  than  usual,  had  set  in  fiercely  while 
they  were  still  two  hundred  miles  northwest  of 
Janver  on  the  Wabiscaw  river;  and  two  days  later, 
in  a  raging  tempest  of  wind  and  snow  they  had 
come  upon  Joyce  Maitland,  hopelessly  lost  and  on 
the  verge  of  perishing,  seated  disconsolately  and  in 
despair  beside  the  body  of  her  half-breed  guide, 
who  had  accidentally  shot  himself  to  death.  And 
Dan  had  loved  Joyce  from  the  moment  when  he 
picked  her  up  in  his  arms,  carried  her  to  safety, 
wrapped  her  in  warm  blankets,  and  poured  hot 
tea  into  her  to  bring  her  back  to  life. 

In  Janver  he  had  found  Boniface  Wadleigh,  a 
former  chum,  a  lifelong  friend  in  whom  he  had  no 
hesitation  in  confiding— for  the  two  had  not  met 
for  years,  and  Wadleigh  had  not,  until  then,  heard 


RANDALL'S  RENUNCIATION  67 

about  the  tragedy  in  Randall's  life  that  had  driven 
him  into  the  wastelands  of  the  Far  North. 

Wadleigh,  an  adventurer  by  character  and  from 
choice,  held  a  nominal  position  as  the  acting  mana- 
ger of  the  nearly  defunct  M.  &  J.  railroad;  he  had 
succeeded  in  impressing  Randall  with  its  possibili- 
ties—and it  had  ended  by  Randall's  financing 
Wadleigh 's  scheme;  by  his  purchase  of  the  rail- 
road company's  stock;  by  his  inducing  Joyce  Mait- 
land  to  consent  to  hold  all  but  the  directors'  shares 
of  the  stock,  in  her  name;  and  finally  by  the  climax 
of  affairs  that  had  been  brought  to  a  showdown 
that  very  day,  through  the  treachery  and  dishon- 
esty and  underhand  machinations  of  Boniface 
Wadleigh. 

It  had  been  only  because  of  Joyce  Maitland,  and 
his  great  love  of  her,  that  Randall  had  decided  to 
stay,  and  to  invest,  and  to  put  forth  every  atom 
of  his  great  energy  in  the  development  of  the 
railroad.  It  had  been  his  excuse,  made  silently  to 
himself,  for  clinging  to  that  fringe  of  civilization 
instead  of  returning  at  once  to  the  Great  Slave 
region,  whither  every  other  impulse  than  that  one, 
beckoned  him;  and  then,  as  time  had  passed,  and 
nothing  had  happened  to  startle  him  from  his 
sense  of  security,  the  tragedy  in  his  past  from! 
which  he  had  fled  to  the  North,  had  faded  to  but 
little  more  than  a  memory  which  confronted  him 
only  from  time  to  time— only  when  he  was  alone, 
and  got  to  thinking  about  Joyce,  and  his  love  for 
her,  and  realized  that,  as  an  honorable  man,  he 
could  never  ask  her  to  be  his  wife  while  he  con- 
tinued to  live  under  a  name  that  was,  in  reality, 
only  half  of  his  own  full  name. 


68  UP  AGAINST  IT 

But  he  had  believed  that  Joyce  knew  that  he 
loved  her  and  realized  that  there  was  a  reason 
which  would  be  presently  explained  why  he  had 
not  declared  himself;  and  he  had  also  believed,  as 
implicity  as  he  believed  in  God,  that  Joyce  loved 
him— until  the  events  of  that  day  which  was  now 
almost  at  an  end. 

The  awakening  had  been  terrible;  it  was  still 
horribly  unbelievable  and  benumbing  when  he 
stood  in  the  lee  of  the  boulder  at  the  crest  of  the 
ridge  and  gazed  across  the  waste  of  windswept 
snowdrifts  at  the  house  that  was  her  home. 

"It  is  renunciation,  Joyce,"  he  murmured  in- 
audibly,  moving  his  lips  to  form  the  words,  but 
making  no  sound.  "It  is  my  awakening— but  I 
had  rather,  much  rather,  have  dreamed  on,  in- 
definitely. ...  I  might  almost  think  it  was  retri- 
bution, if  I  did  not  know  my  own  justification 
for  what  I  did.  I  would  not  have  run  away,  I 
would  not  have  forgotten  my  own  surname  and 
have  sought  to  hide  myself  forever  from  the  past 

if  I  had  committed  a  wanton  crime;  but "  he 

caught  his  breath,  shook  his  head,  clenched  his 
fists,  and  half  turned  his  back  to  the  valley  with 
its  cluster  of  houses;  nor  did  he  turn  his  gaze 
again  in  that  direction. 

If  he  had  done  so  he  would  have  seen  Joycei 
rush  from  her  home  into  the  road  and  wave  fran- 
tically toward  him  with  the  white  worsted  house- 
shawl  that  she  tore  from  her  shoulders.  She  was 
bareheaded  and  unfurred  against  the  intense  cold, 
but  she  stood  there  waving,  and  calling  to  him  at 
the  top  of  her  voice  until  a  woman  ran  from  the 
house  after  her  and  pulled  her  reluctantly  into  it 


RANDALL'S  RENUNCIATION  69 

again  just  at  the  moment  when  Dan  Randall 
squared  his  shoulders,  and,  without  turning  about 
for  another  glance  toward  Janver,  disappeared 
over  the  crest  of  the  ridge. 

Joyce  had  called  to  him,  beckoned  to  him,  be- 
sought him;  but  he  did  not  know  it;  and  he  strode 
away  seeing  only  the  picture  of  her  that  was  up- 
permost in  his  mind— that  picture  that  she  had 
made  when  she  stood  in  front  of  him  in  the  office 
of  the  railroad  company,  with  the  heavy  quirt, 
butt  foremost,  in  her  grasp— the  quirt  with  which 
he  believed  she  had  struck  him  down  in  defence 
of  Ace  Wadleigh. 

His  thoughts  were  bitter,  indeed— and,  as 
against  Wadleigh,  revengeful. 

"I'll  build  the  Cut-Off,"  he  said  aloud  to»the 
wastes  and  winds  as  he  plodded  on  toward  the 
stone  house  near  White  Lake,  for  the  habit  of 
thinking  aloud  grows  upon  men  who  pass  much 
time  among  the  frozen  solitudes.  "I  will  build  two 
of  them.  One,  across  Magician  pass,  and  another 
one  through  the  Black  Gorge  of  the  Badgers,  from 
Janver  to  Allerton.  I  will  build  them,  and  oper- 
ate them,  if  it  takes  every  dollar  I  own,  and  every 
ounce  of  energy  and  strength  that  I  possess.  I  will 
build  them— and  I  will  put  the  present  M.  &  J. 
railroad  so  out  of  business  that  its  stock  certifi- 
cates won't  be  worth  that  much  wrapping  paper. 
Wadleigh,  and  Taggart,  and  Cuthbert,  and  the 
rest  of  them  can  have  the  M.  &  J.  .  .  .  We'll  see. 
We  will  see  what  comes  out  in  the  wash.  I  have 
been  asleep,  and  dreaming,  but  I'm  awake  now. 
.  .  .  Oh,  yes,"  he  added,  a  few  moments  later,  "I 
am  quite  awake,  now— quite." 


CHAPTER  VIII 
Joyce 

Joyce  had  not  remained  very  long  face  down 
on  her  bed  in  a  passion  of  tears  after  the  scene 
with  Dan  at  the  M.  &  J.  office.  She  started  to  her 
feet  when  there  came  a  rap  at  her  door  and  the 
package  that  Ace  Wadleigh  had  sent  by  the  hand 
of  Taggart  was  delivered  to  her. 

She  tore  it  open,  believing  for  the  moment  that 
it  was  something  from  Dan,  but  she- found,  instead 
that  it  contained  a  mass  of  newspaper  clippings— 
and  a  typewritten  document  from  Wadleigh, 
which  purported  to  be  an  explanation  of  them. 

She  did  not.  need  to  read  them  to  know  what 
they  were  about.  She  knew  already.  She  had 
known,  almost  from  the  beginning,  although  nei- 
therDan  Randall  nor  Ace  Wadleigh  had  suspected 
her  knowledge. 

But  the  packet,  arriving  as  it  did,  and  in  the 
manner  it  did,  enlightened  her  upon  many  of  the 
puzzling  occurrences  of  the  day.  She  read  enough 
of  Ace  Wadleigh's  typewritten  statement  to  recog- 
nize the  animus  of  it,  although  it  was  clothed  in 
the  softest  speech  and  phrase  which  that  master  of 
sophistry  could  command.  She  was  at  the  win- 
dow trying  to  think  out  the  incomprehensible 
aspect  of  it  all  when  she  saw  Dan  ascending  the 


JOYCE  71 

slope  toward  the  summit  of  the  ridge,  and  intui- 
tion, rather  than  judgment,  told  her  instantly 
whither  he  was  bound.  So  she  ran  outside  and 
waved  to  him,  and  called  aloud  to  him— in  vain. 

When  the- woman  pulled  her  into  the  house  and 
began  to  rub  her  ears  and  nose  and  cheeks  with 
coarse,  rough,  but  kindly  hands,  Joyce  knew  that 
she  required  no  such  attention.  The  blood  that 
was  coursing  so  madly  through  her  veins,  the  ex- 
citement and  the  eagerness  that  was  stirring  with- 
in her,  would  more  than  overcome  the  brief  ex- 
posure to  the  frost.  She  broke  away  and  ran  to 
her  own  room  again,  and  it  did  not  take  her  long 
to  wrap  herself  once  more  in  the  furs  which  en- 
veloped her  from  head  to  foot,  and  to  go  forth 
with  all  speed  toward  the  house  where  Ace  Wad- 
leigh  lived.  There  were  a  hundred  questions,  and 
more,  which  she  had  determined  to  ask  him  with- 
out delay.  But  when  she  got  there  the  house  was 
deserted.  Yvonne  had  lost  no  time  in  going  about 
the  directions  that  Dan  Randall  had  given  her. 

The  door  was  not  fastened.  Nobody  thought 
of  locking  doors,  in  Janver.  Joyce  raised  the 
latch  and  entered;  and  she  knew,  the  instant  she 
crossed  the  threshold,  that  Dan  had  been  there. 
She  saw  upon  the  floor  where  he  had  been  stand- 
ing while  he  talked  with  Yvonne  some  tiny  shreds 
of  the  Turkish  tobacco  which  he  alone  in  all  that 
community  used  in  his  pipe,  and  in  the  occasional 
rolling  of  cigarettes;  and  she  found  on  the  hearth, 
where  he  had  flung  it,  unlighted,  when  he  had 
gone  out  so  suddenly,  the  cigarette  itself. 

Joyce  crossed  to  the  door  that  opened  upon 
Wadleigh's  part  of  the  house,  and  tapped  against 


72  UP  AGAINST  IT 

it.  Receiving  no  answer,  she  pushed  it  open,  and 
entered,  and  the  condition  of  the  room,  evidencing 
as  it  did  every  sign  of  a  hasty  departure,  told  her 
acute  senses  and  quick  intuition  much  that  had 
happened— and  suggested  much  more  that,  might 
still  happen. 

"What  is  the  meaning  of  it  all?"  she  asked 
herself,  inaudibly.  Then  she  wheeled  sharply  at 
the  click  of  the  latch  of  the  outer  door. 

She  thought  that  the  newcomer  might  be  Wad- 
leigh,  and  for  an  instant  was  paralyzed  by  the> 
thought  of  his  finding  her  there.  But  she  heard 
something  fall  to  the  floor  of  the  other  room  with 
a  heavy  thud,  and  she  stepped  quickly  into  the 
doorway  to  discover  Yvonne,  who  was  looking 
down  upon  a  small  leather  trunk,  which  she  had 
evidently  just  brought  into  the  house;  and,  though 
really  small,  it  looked  much  too  large  for  the  little 
French  woman  to  have  carried  on  her  back.  Joyce 
had  never  seen  the  trunk  before,  so  she  did  not 
recognize  it  as  the  property  of  Dan  Randall. 

Yvonne,  with  the  instinct  of  wildness  that  was 
inherent  in  her,  sensed  the  presence  of  another! 
person,  and  turned.  An  hour  sooner  she  would 
have  greeted  Joyce  with  a  warm  smile  of  wel- 
come, but  now,  with  that  last  remark  of  the  m'sieu 
still  in  her  mind,  her  eyes  remained  cold  and  un- 
compromising, and  there  was  the  suggestion  of  a 
frown  between  her  brows.  M'sieu  had  said: 
"Miss  Maitland  least  of  all";  and  Yvonne  remem- 
bered not  only  the  words,  but  the  tone  of  them. 

Joyce  did  not  ask  the  question  that  had  been 
in  her  mind.  The  presence  of  the  leather  trunk 
and  the  attitude  of  Yvonne  as  she  bent  over  it, 


JOYCE  73 

brought  forth  a  different  one.  For  she  had  seen 
Dan  Randall  crossing  the  ridge,  and  she  already 
knew  about  the  devotion  which  this  pretty  little 
French  woman  and  her  husband,  Jules,  gave  to 
him.  She  spoke,  therefore,  impulsively. 

"Are  you  going  away,  Yvonne?  and  with  Mr. 
Randall?"  she  asked,  rather  breathlessly. 

Yvonne  nodded.  Her  brilliant  eyes,  now  some- 
what sombre  in  their  expression,  stared  unwink- 
ingly  and  uncompromisingly  into  the  eyes  of  Joyce 
Maitland. 

"Where  are  you  going?" 

Yvonne  did  not  respond  to  that  question  by 
so  much  as  a  gesture,  and  Joyce,  looking  upon  her, 
vaguely  wondered  how  it  was  that  a  face  so  pretty 
and  usually  so  animated,  could  take  upon  itself 
such  stolidity  of  expression.  She  went  on: 

"He  has  already  gone.  I  saw  him.  He  was 
crossing  the  ridge  toward  White  Lake,  and  the 
pass.  He  was  fastening  snowshoes  to  his  feet. 
Surely,  Yvonne,  he  is  not  thinking  to  cross  Lan- 
towa  now?" 

No  answer.  No  change  of  expression.  Nothing 
at  all  from  Yvonne. 

"Won't  you  answer  me?  Please  tell  me  where 
Mr.  Randall  was  going.  .  .  .  What  is  the  matter 
with  you,  Yvonne?  You  have  always  liked  me 
—or  seemed  to.  You  have  been  kind  to  me.  .  .  . 
Please  tell  me  what  it  all  means,  won't  you?" 

"How,  mademoiselle,  should  Yvonne  know 
where  m'sieu  may  go?  M'sieu  does  not  consult 
Yvonne  about  hees  business."  She  had  found 
her  voice  at  last. 

"But  he  has  been  here,"  Joyce  cried  out.      "I 


74  UP  AGAINST  IT 

know  that  he  has.  See!"  She  picked  up  the 
discarded  cigarette  from  the  hearth  and  held  it 
out  toward  the  Frenchwoman;  but  Yvonne  only 
shrugged  her  shoulders  in  a  gesture  which  meant 
nothing  at  all.  "Why  do  you  bring  that  leather 
trunk  into  your  house?  Whose  is  it?  Please 
tell  me  what  I  wish  to  know,  for  I  am  sure  that  you 
can,  if  you  will" 

Yvonne  was  silent.  More,  she  did  not  offer  her 
guest  a  chair.  Never  before  within  the  knowl- 
edge of  Joyce  had  the  pretty  little  Frenchwoman 
been  guilty  of  a  breach  of  etiquette. 

"Where  is  Mr.  Wadleigh?"  Joyce  asked,  after 
another  moment.  "Has  he  gone  away,  too,  over 
that  terrible  mountain?" 

Yvonne  started.  Mademoiselle  had  really 
guessed,  then,  the  destination  of  m'sieu;  or  per- 
haps he  had  told  her,  or  sent  word  to  her.  But 
the  question  was  a  safe  one.  Yvonne  could  reply 
to  that,  and  she  did  so,  volubly. 

"Heem?  Bah!!"  she  exclaimed,  and  the  scorn 
in  her  voice  and  contempt  in  her  eyes  when  she 
referred  to  Wadleigh  spoke  volumes.  She  felt, 
too,  that  she  had  no  need  to  restrain  herself  upon 
that  subject.  Was  she  not  leaving,  and  at  once, 
as  soon  as  she  could  get  her  things  together,  the 
house  of  m'sieu  Wadleigh?  for  the  young  woman 
had  no  thought  of  awaiting  the  return  of  her  hus- 
band and  the  m'sieu  to  make  the  change  for  which 
permission  had  Deen  granted  her— for  which  she 
had  prayed  in  the  silence  because  she  had  not 
dared  to  ask  it.  She  had  determined  while  Ran- 
dall was  talking  to  her  that  the  stone  house  at 
White  Lake  should  shelter  her  that  very  night, 


JOYCE  75 

and  she  had  lost  not  a  moment  of  time  in  secur- 
ing the  leather  trunk,  and  in  procuring  the  serv- 
ices of  one  of  her  own  countrymen  in  the  town  to 
assist  her  in  making  the  change.  Presently,  as 
soon  as  mademoiselle  should  have  gone,  she  would 
return  to  the  room  of  m'sieu  for  the  tin  box,  and 
the  papers,  and  the  roll  of  blue-prints  and  tracings 
that  stood  in  the  corner.  "Heem!!"  she  said, 
with  her  characteristic  shrug.  "I  do  not  know 
where  heem  go.  I  not  care.  Heem  come  to  the 
back  door,  like  a  t'ief  in  the  night.  Heem  entre, 
heem  put  on  hees  furs,  and  heem  go  out  again,, 
also  like  one  t'ief.  Then,  bimeby,  as  mademoiselle 
say,  the  m'sieu  come  here.  M'sieu  go  too.  But 
not  like  the  other  one.  Not  like  one  t'ief.  And 
now  I  go,  ver' soon.  .  .  .  Apresvous."  It  was  a 
hint,  none  too  delicately  given,  for  Joyce  to  take 
her  departure,  and  Joyce  read  it  correctly,  and 
realized,  also,  that  it  would  be  utterly  useless  to 
seek  for  further  information  from  Yvonne,  whose 
attitude  gravely  disturbed  her. 

Only  yesterday  Yvonne  had  kissed  her  hands, 
and  had  laughed  outright  with  gladness  when  in 
return  she  had  kissed  the  Frenchwoman  on  the 
cheek.  Only  yesterday,  at  the  slightest  sign  of 
pain  or  sorrow,  Yvonne  would  impulsively  have 
thrown  her  arms  around  the  girl  whom  she  knew 
the  m'sieu  loved  so  well;  but  now  it  was  all 
changed. 

Joyce  could  not  understand  it  in  the  least.  So 
many  things  had  happened  since  the  moment  of 
her  entering  the  office  of  the  railroad  company 
that  afternoon,  and  she  could  not  find  a  logical  or 
a  reasonable  explanation  for  any  of  them. 


76  UP  AGAINST  IT 

But  the  American  girl  had  pluck,  and  she  was 
possessed  with  the  courage  of  her  convictions.  She 
was  brave  to  fearlessness  where  real  danger  was 
concerned,  was  inured  to  the  cold  and  the  hard- 
ships of  the  North,  and  she  did  not  hesitate  when 
the  conviction  of  impending  calamity  came  upon 
her  in  that  moment,  to  decide  for  her  what  she 
should  do. 

There  had  been  a  quarrel  of  some  sort  between 
Ace  Wadleigh  and  Dan  Randall,  and  she  was, 
somehow,  involved  in  it.  That  much  she  be- 
lieved she  knew.  Wadleigh  had  stolen  into  his 
own  home  "like  a  t'ief  in  the  night,"  had  taken 
his  furs,  and  gone,  and  therefore  it  seemed  to  her 
that  he  had  started,  and  with  secrecy,  to  cross 
Lantowa  mountain  by  Magician  pass. 

And  Dan  had  followed  Wadleigh  to  his  Tiouse, 
had  arrived  there  after  the  departure  of  Wadleigh 
and  had  gone  away  again,  with  snowshoes;  there- 
fore, for  some  reason,  he  was  following  on  the  trail 
of  the  man  with  whom  he  had  quarreled. 

To  her  quick  mind  there  could  be  but  one  ex- 
planation for  that  act,  and  the  mere  thought  of 
it  frightened  her  horribly.  She  knew  about  that 
violent  temper  that  was  Dan  Randall's  inheritance 
—she  knew,  too,  to  what  lengths  it  would  drive 
him  when  it  was  thoroughly  aroused,  for  she  was 
much  better  informed  than  either  Randall  or  Wad- 
leigh guessed  of  the  terrible  consequences  of  one 
such  experience  of  Dan's. 

So  she  summed  it  all  up  in  the  decision  that  the 
quarrel  between  the  two  men  had  urged  the  im- 
mediate and  secret  departure  of  Wadleigh  for 
Magician,  at  the  other  side  of  the  mountain;  that 


JOYCE  77 

Dan,  having  sought  him  at  his  home  and  found 
him  gone,  had  followed,  and  with  the  certain  anger 
in  his  heart  that  might  lead  to  the  death  of  one, 
or  both,  if  the  two  should  get  together  in  the  moun- 
tain pass.  Added  to  Dan's  other  cause  for  anger 
no  matter  what  it  might  be,  would  be  the  terrible 
rage  of  jealousy,  and  there  is  none  other  so  fierce 
and  implacable.  For  Dan  had  said  enough  to 
Joyce  in  his  last  speech  with  her  at  the  office  to 
assure  her  of  that  much. 

Her  one  thought,  as  she  turned  her  back  upon 
Yvonne  and  ran  from  the  house,  was  that  she  must 
somehow  get  to  the  entrance  to  the  pass  before  Dan 
Randall  could  make  it,  although  she  realized,  even 
when  the  thought  came  to  her,  how  impossible  it 
appeared  to  be.  But  she  was  determined  to  make 
the  effort,  and  there  was  just  one  way  by  which 
it  might  be  done. 

The  railroad  was  impassibly  blocked,  and  fath- 
oms deep  with  snow  in  the  canyon  through 
the  mountains,  but  it  had  been  kept  open  as  far 
as  Nelson,  at  the  entrance  to  Rickett's  canyon,  and 
there  were  locomotives  in  the  round-house  near 
the  station.  One  of  them,  at  least,  would  have 
steam,  and  it  could  take  her  as  far  as  Bluerock, 
which  was  the  nearest  approach  the  railway  made 
to  Magician  pass.  There  would  still  be  two  miles 
and  more  to  cover  to  the  pass,  but  there  were 
snowshoes  to  be  had,  a-plenty,  and  she  was  fleet- 
ness  itself  in  the  use  of  them. 

The  engineer  whom  she  would  find  in  charge 
at  the  roundhouse  was  devoted  to  her.  She  al- 
ways rode  in  the  cab  with  him  through  Rickett's 
canyon,  in  the  summer  time,  and  he  had  been  de- 


78  UP  AGAINST  IT 

lighted  to  show  her  the  manner  of  starting,  and 
stopping,  and  curbing,  and  controlling  the  monster 
of  iron  and  steel  that  was  so  entirely  responsive  to 
his  slightest  touch.  Engineer  Tom  Rodman,  taci- 
turn, and  grizzled  by  the  frosts  of  years  though  he 
was,  had  long  ago  succumbed  to  the  charm  of 
Joyce  Maitland,  as  all  did  who  came  in  contact 
with  it;  and  Joyce  knew  and  understood  her  power 
without  being  in  the  least  spoiled  by  it. 

Rodman  was  not  beside  his  engine,  nor  any- 
where near  it,  when  she  got  there.  She  called 
many  times  to  him,  but  he  did  not  reply.  But  the 
big,  metallic  steed  was  there.  It  stood  in  its 
place,  resting,  while  it  pulsed  and  throbbed  like 
a  live  thing  that  breathed  with  the  regularity  of 
heart  beats. 

Joyce  ran  hither  and  thither  calling  to  Rodman, 
but  he  was  temporarily  across  the  tracks  in  a  place 
where  there  was  a  glowing  fire  and  warmth  and 
cheer,  looking  over  the  shoulders  of  a  man  who 
was  playing  cards  with  three  others ;  and  his  fire- 
man was  beside  him.  Neither  of  them  heard  the 
voice  of  Joyce  Maitland  calling  to  them. 

In  her  excitement  and  eagerness  Joyce  sprang 
upon  the  step  of  the  cab  and  lifted  herself  into  it. 
A  glance  at  the  steam  guage  reassured  her.  She 
closed  the  door  of  the  fire-box.  A  look  ahead  along 
the  rails  told  her  that  the  switches  were  correctly 
set,  and  she  remembered  all  that  Rodman  had 
taught  her.  She  knew  also  that  the  track  would 
be  clear,  and  that  she  had  nothing  to  fear  on  that 
account.  Without  an  instant  of  hesitation  she 
opened  the  throttle  with  a  gentle  touch  and  let 
the  steam  into  the  cylinders,  and  the  great  ma- 


JOYCE  79 

chine  moved  forward  as  softly  as  the  tread 
of  a  wild  animal  upon  the  snow,  and  without  a 
jar. 

Joyce  peered  ahead  of  her  along  the  gleaming 
rails,  keen-eyed  and  alert,  while  the  engine  crawled 
from  its  stall  in  the  round-house,  and  out  across 
the  locked  turn-table  which  had  been  set  for  its 
ready  accommodation.  It  was  the  only  locomo- 
tive with  steam  up  on  that  division,  as  Joyce  well 
knew. 

Every  switch  was  as  correctly  set  as  if  each; 
one  had  been  specially  thrown  for  her  sudden  ex- 
tremity. She  saw  them,  and  was  glad;  and  she 
opened  the  throttle  little  by  little,  but  rapidly, 
nevertheless,  so  that  by  the  time  the  locomotive 
arrived  at  the  main  line  track  and  swung  out  upon 
it,  Rodman's  engine  was  going  well,  and  gaining 
speed  with  every  plunge  of  the  pistons. 

There  was  only  a  lone  young  woman  at  the 
throttle  in  the  cab,  but  she  was  a  determined  one, 
and  she  believed  that  she  had  a  duty  to  perform 
which  was  far  greater  than  any  she  had  ever  faced 
before.  She  went  about  it  as  the  locomotive  went 
about  its  part  of  the  performance— with  ever-in- 
creasing energy  and  life;  and  presently— Joyce 
had  no  idea  of  the  rate  of  speed  they  had  attained 
—she  was  fairly  flying  down  the  main  line  track 
toward  the  goal  of  her  present  ambition:  the  small, 
deserted  station  called  Bluerock,  used  only  in  the 
summer  time,  situated  two  miles  from  the  en- 
trance to  Magician  pass. 

She  had  forgotten  all  about  snowshoes  and  was 
reminded  of  the  fact  only  when  she  discovered  a 
pair  of  them  that  belonged  to  Rodman  tied  fast 


80  UP  AGAINST  IT 

beneath  the  roof  of  the  cab.  She  would  take  them 
down,  presently,  and  use  them. 

Once  she  climbed  down  from  her  perch  to  open 
the  furnace  door  and  feed  several  shovelfuls  of 
coal  to  the  fire,  and  when  she  mounted  to  the 
driver's  seat  again  she  was  amazed  by  the  speed 
they  had  attained;  for  there  was  a  slight  down- 
ward grade  from  Janver,  until  the  rails  ran  along 
beside  the  bank  of  the  river. 

It  was  eight  miles  to  Bluerock.  She  was  amazed 
when  she  came  upon  the  place  so  quickly.  It 
seemed  to  loom  before  her  as  soon  as  she  climbed 
back  upon  Rodman's  perch  after  feeding  the  fire. 
But  she  understood  the  air,  and  how  to  use  it, 
that  being  one  of  the  things  that  Rodman  had 
taught  her,  and  she  came  to  a  stop  at  the  end  of 
what  would  have  been  the  platform  of  the  station 
had  it  not  been  many  feet  deep  under  the  snow. 
Deliberately  she  backed  her  iron  horse  to  a  better 
place  for  dismounting,  opened  the  door  of  the  fire- 
box to  deaden  the  fire,  and,  with  the  snowshoes  in 
her  hand,  jumped  down. 

And  then,  when  she  had  adjusted  the  snowshoes 
properly  to  her  small  feet,  she  noticed  for  the  first 
time  that  the  daylight  was  fading  and  that  dark- 
ness would  soon  be  upon  her. 

Winter  days  are  short  in  the  far  northwest,  but 
Joyce  was  undaunted,  and  without  a  backward 
glance  she  started  across  the  snow  toward  the 
mouth  of  Magician  pass. 


CHAPTER  IX 

At  the  Devil's  Pulpit 

Much  happened  on  Lantowa  mountain  during 
the  wild  winter's  night  that  followed. 

Ace  Wadleigh  and  Ben  Taggart,  with  the  Indian, 
Lightfoot,  for  guide,  had  a  good  hour's  start  of 
Dan  Randall  and  Jules,  and  that  much  advantage 
at  the  beginning  of  the  trip  across  Magician  pass 
meant  a  lot.  It  meant  for  one  thing  that  the  men 
who  were  conspiring  to  deprive  Randall  of  all  that 
he  had  struggled  so  hard  to  obtain  and  who  intend- 
ed now  to  rob  him  of  all  he  possessed,  had  passed 
over  the  easiest  part  of  the  trail  and  approached 
the  beginning  of  the  climax  of  their  hazardous 
journey,  while  Dan  and  Jules  were  at  the  com- 
mencement of  it. 

Also,  with  the  going  down  of  the  sun  behind  the 
Badger  range  across  the  valley  to  the  west  of  Jan- 
ver  came  not  only  black  darkness,  but  also  the 
sudden  and  unheralded  beginning  of  another  vio- 
lent storm.  Even  Jules  had  not  foreseen  that 
storm  which  swept  down  upon  them  from  the  north 
with  almost  the  suddenness  of  a  lightning  stroke, 
and  he  shook  his  head  doubtfully  when  it  burst 
upon  them  in  all  its  fury  at  the  moment  when 
they  entered  the  first  defile  of  the  pass. 

"Heem  ver'  bad;  dat  storm,  m'sieu,"  he  said 


82  UP  AGAINST  IT 

to  Dan,  as  they  were  starting  on  again,  after  hav- 
ing been  compelled  literally  to  stop  in  their  tracks 
by  the  force  and  fury  of  the  first  onslaught  of  the 
wind.  "Here,  eet  ees  nothing;  but  up  dere— 
sacrrre!" 

"Wadleigh  is  a  good  bit  ahead  of  us,  Jules," 
Dan  replied,  gesturing  toward  the  plainly  marked 
trail  that  the  others  had  left  behind  them,  and 
which  was  becoming  rapidly  obliterated  before 
their  eyes  by  the  darkness,  as  well  as  by  the  storm. 
In  another  five  or  ten  minutes  it  would  entirely 
disappear,  as  if  men  and  dogs  had  never  passed 
that  way  since  the  beginning  of  the  world.  They 
had  come  upon  it  a  hundred  yards  back,  for  Wad- 
leigh  and  his  companions  had  approached  the  gate- 
way through  the  mountains,  from  the  railway 
tracks  near  Bluestone,  while  Dan  and  Jules  arrived 
from  the  opposite  direction,  toward  White  Lake. 

Jules  nodded  his  head.  He  had  studied  that 
trail  when  they  first  came  upon  it,  but  he  had  made 
no  remark  concerning  it.  He  had  not  been  told 
how  much  or  how  little  his  beloved  m'sieu  knew 
concerning  that  other  expedition  over  the  pass. 
Jules  was  not  one  to  volunteer  unnecessary  in- 
formation, but  he  could  read  the  signs?  of,  a  trail 
with  the  same  clearness  and  exactitude  that1  would 
have  applied  to  Dan  with  the  printed  page  of  a 
book  before  his  eyes. 

"Who  has  Wadleigh  got  with  him?"  Dan  asked, 
presently.  Jules  replied  without  hesitation,  for 
he  knew  how  to  answer  as  perfectly  as  if  he  had 
seen  them  with  his  own  eyes. 

"M'sieu  Taggarrr,  Lightfoot  with  heem  sled, 
and  seex  dogs— and  ze  bum,"  he  said,  and  shouted 


AT  THE  DEVIL'S  PULPIT  83 

at  his  own  faithful  creatures  to  urge  them  onward. 
A  terrific  gust  of  wind  charged  with  millions  of 
particles  of  frozen  snow  broke  upon  them  from  the 
upper  end  of  the  defile  and  shut  off  further  oppor- 
tunity for  speech  for  many  minutes;  but  it  lulled, 
presently,  as  it  had  begun,  and  while  the  dogs 
shook  their  shaggy  coats  and  lapped  up  tonguesf  ul 
of  freshly  fallen  snow,  Dan  repeated  the  last  two 
words  that  Jules  had  used. 

"The  bum?  Who  is  he?  Whom  do  you  mean, 
Jules?" 

'  'Heem  called  Pete  Gaffney,  m'sieu.  Heem  one 
beeg  drunk.  What  for  they  breeng  heem  wit* 
dem?  I  do  not  know  what  for.  But  et  ees  not 
good.  No,  m'sieu.  Heem  wear  boots— wit'  heels. 
Heem  freeze,  mabby.  Heem  drunk,  too,  mabby, 
an'  not  understand."  He  ended  with  an  expres- 
sive shrug  of  his  wide  shoulders. 

Ten  minutes  later  they  stopped  again,  and  Jules, 
having  shouldered  and  fought  his  way  through 
what  appeared  to  be  an  impenetrable  wall  of  snow, 
led  the  dogs  into  a  cavernous  recess  among  the 
rocks  where  they  were  temporarily  sheltered  from 
the  fury  of  the  storm  that  raged  harmlessly  over 
their  heads. 

"We  rest  ici,"  he  announced,  calmly.  "No  good 
go  on,  now.  Too  dark.  Get  lost,  mabby.  Bime- 
by  the  moon,  heem  shine  behind  the  clouds;  give 
light  just  one  leetle  bit." 

"Can  we  make  it,  Jules?"  Dan  asked,  anxiously. 

"For  sure,  m'sieu.  We  will  do  eet,  coute  qu'fi- 
coute.  Yes,  m'sieu.  But  now,  for  a  time,  we  rest. 
Afterward,  we  make  much  haste.  Ah,  ze  weend, 
heem  blow  for  sure." 


84  UP  AGAINST  IT 

The  cold  was  intense  even  within  that  sheltered 
nook  among  the  rocks,  and  it  was  not  long  before 
the  practical  Jules  roused  Dan  from  a  sleepy  leth- 
argy into  which  he  was  falling,  shook  him  roughly, 
and  announced: 

"Aliens,  m'sieu!  We  go  on.  Go  to  sleep  now, 
nevair  wake  up.  The  moon,  heem  wayway  be- 
hind theem  clouds,  but  heem  light,  just  a  leetle  bit; 
heem  bore  t 'rough  dem  so  we  see  'nuff,  mabby." 

The  dogs  whined  protestingly,  but  the  start  was 
made,  and  for  an  hour  after  that  they  toiled  on- 
ward and  upward  amid  the  smother  of  the  falling 
snow,  which  would  have  filled  the  defile  and  effec- 
tually have  impeded  their  further  ascent  had  it 
not  been  that  the  direction  of  the  wind,  as  well  as 
the  fury  of  it,  cleared  the  gulch  of  the  white 
tempest  almost  as  fast  as  it  fell  into  it.  The  moon, 
thickly  veiled  behind  the  storm  clouds,  still  found 
some  means  of  lessening  the  profundity  of  the 
darkness,  rather  than  of  dispelling  it.  They  could 
see  dimly  the  outlines  of  the  cliffs  above  them 
against  the  sky  whenever  for  an  instant  the  flying 
snow  was  blown  away,  or  was  lifted. 

For  the  most  of  the  time  they  stumbled  dog- 
gedly onward,  keeping  to  the  course  by  the  in- 
stinct of  the  dogs,  and  by  reason  of  the  long  ex- 
perience of  Jules  Legarde,  developed  under  even 
worse  conditions  than  that  one.  Nor  would  it 
have  been  possible  for  them  to  get  very  far  out  of 
their  route,  owing  to  the  narrowness  of  the  defile 
through  which  they  were  passing.  Still,  there 
were  many  treacherous  places  to  guard  against 
and  avoid.  The  mountain  torrents,  which  spring- 
time after  springtime  for  untold  ages  had  been 


AT  THE  DEVIL'S  PULPIT  85 

deepening  and  widening  Magician  pass,  had  left 
many  a  crevasse  and  jagged  depth  in  its  course,  in 
which  lurked  certain  death  if  one  should  wander 
over  the  edge  of  one  of  them. 

It  was  far  into  the  night  when  they  arrived  at 
Devil's  Pulpit;  aptly  named,  because  it  stood  at 
the  head  of  the  defile  up  which  they  had  been  toil- 
ing, facing  it.  In  the  summer  time  one  might 
climb  hazardously  to  the  top  of  it  and  from  there 
look  down  through  the  twisted  maze  of  rocks  be- 
neath the  jutting  cliffs  on  either  side,  to  the  spread 
of  green  beyond  it;  and  many  a  party  had  been 
sheltered  from  a  sudden  shower  beneath  it,  for  the 
ice  and  water  of  many  centuries  had  worn  out  a 
roomy  hollow  under  the  massive  rock,  and  had  left 
it  supported  by  three  roughly-shaped  natural  pil- 
lars. Sometimes,  when  there  was  a  particularly 
violent  rain  storm,  the  stage  coach,  which  in  sum- 
mer crossed  by  the  pass  between  Janver  and  Ma- 
gician twice  each  week,  had  been  driven  be- 
neath the  Devil's  Pulpit;  and  the  six  mules  that 
drew  it,  with  the  huge  coach  and  passengers,  found 
ample  room  there  for  their  accommodation.  Be- 
yond it,  the  pass  was  wide  and  open  to  the  sum- 
mit, where  the  mountains  towered  upward  and 
farther  and  farther  away  on  either  side. 

It  was  the  last  stretch  of  climb  beyond  the  Pul- 
pit, and  even  more  difficult  than  the  way  through 
the  gorge,  and  also  the  first  half  of  the  descent 
beyond  the  summit  of  the  pass,  which  Dan  and 
Jules  dreaded  most  that  night,  although  neither 
had  mentioned  a  word  to  the  other  concerning  it. 

Jules  had  determined  to  stop  at  Devil's  Pulpit. 
Wood  in  plenty  was  always  cut  and  stored  in  the 


86  UP  AGAINST  IT 

hollow  during  the  summer,  for  there  were  many 
cold  days  and  nights  at  the  beginning  of  winter, 
before  the  snow  came,  when  travelers  across  the 
pass  were  glad  to  stop  there  to  make  coffee  and  to 
warm  themselves,  before  continuing  the  journey. 

Oddly  enough,  Randall  and  Jules  found  the 
place  closed  against  them  when  they  got  there. 
The  wind  had  picked  up  giant  handfuls  of  the 
driving  snow,  and  had  packed  it  against  the  mas- 
sive pillars,  and  around  them,  reaching  out  from 
one  to  another  until  it  had  closed  all  three  open- 
ings. But  Jules  knew  how  to  find  the  weakest 
place  in  the  snowy  barrier,  and  with  the  short- 
handled  shovel  that  was  part  of  the  equipment 
of  the  dog-sled,  he  soon  tore  an  opening  through  it. 

The  dogs  waited  with  impatience  while  he  did  so, 
and  they  lurched  forward  through  the  breach  the 
moment  it  was  big  enough.  But  they  stopped, 
with  the  sled  filling  the  narrow  passageway  as  if 
it  were  wedged  there.  They  whined,  and  hud- 
dled close  together,  and  acted  so  strangely  that 
Dan,  who  knew  something  of  the  way  of  huskies, 
wondered  what  had  happened. 

Jules  knew,  instantly,  what  had  affected  the 
dogs.  Every  one  of  the  eight  was  a  personal  pet, 
and  had  been  raised  by  him  from  puppyhood. 
They  were  not  like  the  animals  we  read  about, 
which  are  taught  to  serve  and  to  haul  heavy  bur- 
dens across  the  mountains,  and  are  hammered  and 
kicked  and  cursed  at,  and  sometimes  eaten,  when 
other  means  of  procuring  food  are  not  at  hand. 
Jules  knew  at  once  that  there  was  a  human  being 
there,  and  one  who  was  a  stranger  to  them;  and 
he  called  to  them  in  French,  and  by  their  names, 


AT  THE  DEVIL'S  PULPIT  87 

one  after  another,  while  he  worked  with  all  his 
might  with  the  shovel,  and  so  tore  his  way  into 
the  hollow  beside  them. 

"What  is  it,  Jules?"  Dan  called  out  to  him. 

"A  man,  m'sieu.  The  bum,  1 1 'ink.  Yes.  Eet 
ees  the  drunk.  Can  you  come  een?" 

"Yes.  .  .  .  Where  is  he?  Heavens!  I  thought 
it  was  dark  outside,  but  in  here " 

The  striking  of  a  light  by  Jules,  who  had  hur- 
ried across  the  hollow,  interrupted  further  speech. 

With  quickness  that  was  remarkable  under  the 
circumstances,  Jules  kindled  a  fire  with  the  dry 
wood  that  he  knew  perfectly  well  where  to  find. 
Then  he  ran  back  to  the  man  who  was  lying  in  a 
huddled  heap  upon  the  rock  floor  of  the  cavernous 
place,  and  unceremoniously  brushing  Randall  aside 
listened  at  his  breast  for  heart  beats  until  he  was 
convinced  that  there  was  still  the  flutter  of  life 
inside  the  man.  Then  he  set  to  work  with  a  will, 
and  as  one  who  knew  exactly  what  to  do. 

Dan  assisted  him  where  and  however  he  could, 
and  once  they  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  the 
man  open  his  eyes  half  way,  but  not  to  intelli- 
gence, nor  consciousness  of  his  surroundings ;  only 
to  a  partial  realization  of  the  intense  pain  he  was 
suffering  because  of  their  efforts  to  bring  him 
back  to  life.  Then  he  died. 

"No  use,  m'sieu,"  Jules  said,  without  emotion, 
rising.  "Eet  ees  la  mort.  He  ees  gone.  Voila. 
Eet  ees  for  that  he  was  made  to  come  here."  He 
shrugged  his  shoulders  and  turned  his  back  upon 
the  body,  moving  toward  the  fire,  which  was  now 
blazing  merrily. 

Dan  hesitated  a  moment,  then  followed  him,  but 


88  UP  AGAINST  IT 

with  a  backward  glance  toward  the  dead  man  as 
he  went.  It  had  been  their  intention  on  reaching 
the  Devil's  Pulpit  to  rest  for  an  hour  or  more,  to 
make  some  coffee,  and  to  eat  a  little  of  the  food 
they  had  brought  with  them,  and  then  to  take  up 
their  journey  again. 

The  dead  man  was  merely  an  incident  from 
Jules'  point  of  view.  They  had  not  been  able 
to  save  him,  and  had  only  succeeded  in  making  him 
sensible  of  one  moment  of  excruciating  pain,  in 
their  efforts  to  revive  him.  But  while  Jules  made 
the  coffee  and  Dan  sat  not  too  near  to  the  fire, 
watching,  he  found  that  the  last  remark  that  Jules 
had  made  kept  recurring  to  him:  "Eet  ees  for  that 
he  was  made  to  come  here." 


CHAPTER  X 

The  Dead  Forger 

When  the  coffee  was  ready,  and  the  warm  glow 
of  it  pervaded  their  bodies,  Dan  asked: 

"Why  did  you  say  that,  Jules?  Why  do  you 
think  that  they  brought  him  up  here  on  the  pass, 
to  desert  him  and  let  him  freeze  to  death?" 

Jules  shrugged  his  shoulders  before  he  replied. 
Then  he  drained  his  cup  and  reached  out  for  the 
pot  to  refill  it. 

"Eet  seem  so  to  me,  m'sieu,"  he  said.  "For 
why  deed  they  breeng  the  bum  ovair  the  pass?  To 
keel  heem;  non?  Eet  seems  so  to  Jules.  He  has 
been  ivre— ver'  drunk,  m'sieu— what  you  call  para- 
lyzed—all the  time  seence  m'sieu  Wadleigh  have 
heem  all  the  day  at  hees  office,  and  all  the  night 
afterward  at  la  cabane.  And  all  the  time  the  bum, 
heem  write,  write,  write,  ovair  and  ovair.  Je  ne 
sais  quoi  for." 

"Do  you  mean  that  he  was  at  the  office  with 
Wadleigh?  this  man— this  dead  man  whom  you 
call  the  bum?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu.  Two,  free  days,  apres  you  go 
away." 

"And  at  the  house,  in  Wadleigh's  room  with 
him?  Writing?" 

"Yes,   m'sieu.    And  the   sheets  heem  write, 


90  UP  AGAINST  IT 

m'sieu  Wadleigh  heem  tear  up  into  leetle  bits,  so, 
and  so,  and  t'row  away.  But  I,  Jules,  pick  up 
the  pieces,  every  leetle  bit  and  save  them  for 
m'sieu.  Yvonne,  she  have  dem  now  for  m'sieu. 
The  writing,  all  of  eet,  was  like  the  same 
which  you,  m'sieu,  put  at  the  bottom  of  the 
cheque."  Jules  could  neither  write  nor  read,  but 
if  once  he  had  seen  a  signature,  it  was  like  the 
track  of  an  animal  in  the  snow;  he  never  forgot  it. 

"So,"  said  Dan,  and  turned  his  head  to  glance 
toward  the  dead  man,  "he  was  the  forger  who 
wrote  my  name  so  many  times  on  the  sheet  of 
paper  I  found  on  Wadleigh 's  desk.  ...  I  am  be- 
ginning to  understand,  now,"  he  added,  turning 
again  to  his  companion. 

He  drank  off  the  contents  of  his  cup,  arose,  and 
crossed  to  the  body,  which  he  began  at  once  to 
search,  turning  out  every  pocket  as  he  found  it, 
and  discovering  nothing.  Not  until  he  had  pulled 
the  last  one  out,  and  with  the  same  result,  did  he 
desist.  Then,  in  silence,  he  returned  to  his  place 
near  the  fire. 

Jules,  who  had  watched  closely  his  every  act, 
smiled  .grimly,  left  his  place,  and  crossed  to  the 
body  of  the  dead  man.  He  bent  above  it,  and  un- 
fastened one  article  after  another  of  the  clothing 
that  the  man  had  worn,  although  it  was  all  too 
scant  for  protection  against  the  bitter  cold  to< 
which  he  had  been  exposed.  Presently  Jules  bared 
his  left  hand  and  thrust  it  down  against  the  al- 
ready stiffened  body,  and  after  a  moment  he  found 
what  he  sought— a  buckskin  pouch-belt  which 
Gaffney  had  worn  next  to  his  skin.  Jules  carried 
it  to  Dan  and  dropped  it  across  his  master's  knees 


THE  DEAD  FORGER  91 

without  a  word,  then  resumed  his  seat  and  poured 
out  still  another  cupful  of  the  steaming  coffee. 

Dan  regarded  the  belt  wonderingly,  touching  it 
with  the  tips  of  his  mittens,  tentatively.  He  re- 
moved the  coverings  from  his  hands  for  a  mo- 
ment and  felt  along  its  entire  length,  satisfying 
himself  of  two  things;  that  it  contained  no  coin, 
but  that  there  was  something  inside  of  it,  never- 
theless. 

But  he  had  not  the  time,  nor  the  inclination,  and 
there  was  not  light  enough,  to  examine  the  con- 
tents of  the  belt  just  then,  even  if  the  raging  wind 
and  the  bitter  cold  had  not  rendered  such  an  act 
impracticable.  Jules  had  not  stopped  to  unfasten 
the  buckle  in  removing  the  belt  from  the  body  of 
the  dead  man,  but  had  cut  it  with  his  knife,  and  so 
Dan  rolled  and  tied  it  together  and  hid  it  away 
in  one  of  the  large  pockets  of  the  coat  he  wore  be- 
neath his  furs.  Then,  while  he  sat  quite  still,  pon- 
dering upon  this  latest  incident,  Jules  finished 
his  coffee,  put  away  the  things,  bore  the  dead  body 
into  a  recess  among  the  rocks,  and  covered  it 
firmly  and  effectively. 

"En  avant,  m'sieu,"  he  said,  and  Dan  started 
to  his  feet. 

"Where  are  the  others,  Jules?  Where  are  the 
men  who  brought  him  this  far,  and  who  deserted 
him,  and  permitted  him  to  freeze?" 

Jules  waved  his  arm  vaguely  toward  the  east- 
ward, and  the  summit  of  the  pass;  then,  as  if  he 
already  knew  what  the  ensuing  question  would  be, 
he  replied  to  it  before  it  was  spoken. 

* '  Yes,  m '  sieu.  We  catch  theem, ' '  he  said.  ' '  At 
de  top." 


92  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Let  us  hurry,  then.  But  tell  me,  first,  how  did 
you  know  that  the  dead  man  wore  that  belt  around 
his  body,  next  to  his  skin?" 

"M'sieu,  men  are  like  the  animals.  When  the 
stranger  approaches  too  near  the  place  where  they 
raise  their  young,  or  the  cache  where  they  keep 
their  food,  they  skulk  about  an'  show  their  teeth, 
an'  growl  ver'  mooch.  They  not  like,  an'  they 
show  they  not  like.  An'  the  birds,  when  they  have 
young  in  the  nests,  flutter  an'  cheep-cheep-cheep 
all  around  the  place,  like  they  was  ver'  fou;  non? 
Dees  man,  I  see  heem  at  Thompson's  hotel,  ver' 
drunk.  I  see  with  heem,  m'sieu  Taggarrr,  an' 
m'sieu  Cut'berrr;  an'  I  see  m'sieu  Taggarrr  slap 
heem  on  ze  shoulder,  so;  an'  leeft  him  from  hees 
feet,  so;  an'  the  bum,  he  snarl  like  a  bobcat— pssst! 
—like  that,  and  put  hees  han'  here,  so;  an'  I  say 
to  myself,  thees:  Jules,  mon  ami,  dat  bum  heem 
haf  moneybelt  around  heem,  what  haf  no  money 
in  eet.  Cause  why?  He  no  spend  money.  Den 
what  for  the  belt?  For  somet'ngs  heem  theenk 
worth  more.  Voila.  I  not  remember  eet  again— 
not  unteel  I  see  you  go  to  search  hees  pockets." 

The  violence  of  the  wind  had  increased  rather 
than  abated  when  they  went  forth  again  from  the 
shelter  of  the  Devil's  Pulpit,  but  the  snowstorm 
had  lessened  perceptibly,  the  clouds  had  lifted 
somewhat,  and  the  hidden  moon  succeeded  in 
forcing  a  little  of  its  reflected  light  through 
them. 

It  was  the  very  force  and  strength  of  the  wind 
that  assisted  them  most  in  their  upward  climb,  for 
it  had  packed  the  snow  solidly  where  it  fell,  so 
that  frequently  it  supported  men  and  dogs  and 


THE  DEAD  FORGER  93 

sled,  where  otherwise  they  would  have  sunk  into 
its  depths  out  of  sight. 

They  dug,  and  floundered,  and  fought  their  way 
through,  from  rise  to  rise,  sometimes  gliding  easily 
and  rapidly  over  a  distance  of  an  eighth  of  a  mile, 
or  more,  or  less,  and  again  they  passed  an  hour  in 
covering  less  than  half  the  same  distance. 

They  had  no  thought  of  the  time.  It  had  been 
dark  at  three  in  the  afternoon.  It  would  be  light 
again  at  nine  in  the  morning,  which  would  be  the 
hour  for  opening  the  clerk's  office  at  Magician. 
Dan  Randall  intended  to  be  there,  if  possible, 
when  the  office  was  opened. 


CHAPTER  XI 

The  Tragedy  at  Magician 

At  the  divide— the  summit  of  the  pass— there 
had  been  erected  at  some  unrecorded  time  in  the 
past  a  hut  of  stones  and  logs.  No  windows  nor 
doors  had  been  fitted  to  the  openings  left  for 
them,  and  so  it  had  always  stood  open  to  every 
storm  of  wind  or  snow  or  rain  that  had  hurled 
itself  mercilessly  that  way.  In  the  summer  the 
stage  coach  always  halted  there  for  a  short  rest. 

When  Dan  and  Jules,  after  four  hours  of  cease- 
less toil  against  the  elements,  during  which  they 
had  covered  but  little  more  than  two  additional 
miles,  approached  the  Summit  house,  as  it  was 
called,  Jules  stopped  the  dogs  while  yet  they  were 
forty  rods  from  it.  Then  he  put  his  lips  close  to 
Dan's  ear  and  shouted,  for  the  velocity  of  the  wind 
up  there  rendered  it  almost  impossible  to  hear  a 
spoken  word. 

"Ver'  like  dose  men  are  dere,"  he  said.  "We 
go  fin'  deem,  you  say,  m'sieu?" 

Dan  pondered  for  a  moment. 

The  mere  thought  of  a  period  of  rest,  however 
short,  was  inviting.  It  seemed  to  him  that  never 
before  had  he  been  so  worn.  The  thongs  about 
his  ankles,  which  held  his  snowshoes  in  place,  had 
bitten  through  the  buckskin  leggings  he  wore  and 


THE  TRAGEDY  AT  MAGICIAN         95 

the  layers  of  woolen  beneath  them,  until  they  had 
galled  into  the  skin;  but  so  fierce  was  the  cold  on 
the  mountain  that  he  was  barely  conscious  of  it. 
He  knew  only  that  he  was  dead  tired,  that  their 
journey  was  not  yet  quite  half  made,  and  that  the 
descent  of  the  pass  on  the  opposite  side  of  thei 
mountains  would  be  scarcely  less  difficult  than  the 
ascent  had  been. 

He  knew,  too,  that  they  could  not  be  far  behind 
Wadleigh  and  Taggart,  with  their  Indian  helper, 
Lightfoot,  and  that  Jules  was  probably  right  in 
saying  that  very  likely  the  men  were  even  then 
beneath  the  shelter  of  the  Summit  house,  resting. 

That  moment  of  pondering  was  one  of  weighing 
what  he  conceived  to  be  his  real  duty,  against  his 
inclinations;  for  every  impulse  within  him  urged 
that  he  should  surprise  Wadleigh  in  the  mountain 
cabin,  should  charge  him  with  the  forgery  which 
Dan  now  felt  certain  had  been  committed,  and 
should  openly  accuse  all  of  them  of  the  deliberate 
murder  of  the  man  Gaff ney. 

But  such  an  interruption  would  inevitably  mean 
a  fight,  and  they  would  be  three  against  two;  and 
somebody  among  them  would  be  killed— it  would 
have  to  be  so,  under  the  circumstances. 

Nor  did  Dan  Randall  consider  himself  in  such  a 
possibility.  He  had  the  feeling  that  is  born  in 
some  men:  that  he  would  live  to  accomplish  what 
he  had  set  himself  to  perform.  But  he  had  killed 
one  man,  before  he  dropped  his  last  name  and  be- 
came just  Dan  Randall,  and  the  bitterness  of  it 
was  terrible;  he  did  not  care  to  repeat  the  horror 
of  it,  and  to  endure  again  the  unrest  that  followed 
as  a  consequence. 


96  UP  AGAINST  IT 

And  there  was  Jules,  with  Yvonne  awaiting  his 
return,  and  himself  responsible  for  that  safe  re- 
turn; and  Jules  would  fight  for  him  with  all  the 
wiry  strength  he  possessed— and  might  be  the  one 
to  die.  Moreover,  there  was  the  duty  that  had 
called  him  over  the  Lantowa  mountains  in  the  bit- 
ter cold— and  the  greater  task  beyond  it,  that  he 
had  set  for  himself.  To  build  the  "Janver  Cut- 
off" across  two  mountain  passes— through  Badger 
range  by  way  of  the  Black  gorge,  to  the  westward, 
and  over  Magician  pass  of  the  Lantowa— the  fruit 
of  his  meditation  and  map-study  while  he  had 
awaited  the  return  of  Jules,  in  Ace  Wadleigh's 
room. 

It  was  strange  that  he  had  never  thought  of  that 
before,  with  all  its  immense  possibilities;  stranger 
still  that  he  should  think  of  it  again,  just  then,  at 
the  summit  of  Magician  pass,  while  the  wind 
hurled  itself  against  his  tall  body  at  the  rate  of 
seventy  miles  an  hour,  with  a  temperature  of  fifty 
below  zero  biting  at  his  flesh  and  bones,  and  be- 
numbing him.  He  bent  his  head  and  shouted  back 
to  Jules: 

"Is  there  a  way  around,  that  we  can  follow,  and 
pass  them?" 

1 '  Oui. ' '  Jules  turned  toward  the  dogs.  ' '  Allez ! 
Moosh!  Ar-rrr!"  he  shouted  at  them,  and  they 
started  on  again,  bearing  off  toward  the  right,  and 
away  from  the  house  at  the  summit.  "Eet  ees 
close  to  de  house,  but  eet  ees  with  de  weend.  They 
weel  not  hear  us." 

They  passed,  presently,  within  a  hundred  yards 
of  the  hut,  and  they  could  smell  the  smoke  of  a  fire 
that  had  been  lighted  there;  and  once  Dan  thought 


THE  TRAGEDY  AT  MAGICIAN         97 

that  he  caught  a  glimmer  of  its  light  through  the 
mass  of  driving  snow,  for  up  there  at  the  top  of 
the  pass  it  was  as  thick  as  a  blanket. 

Dan  reached  out  and  touched  Jules  on  the  shoul- 
der; and  the  latter  bent  to  listen. 

"You  go  back,  Jules,  and  find  out  what  they 
are  doing.  Then  follow  after  me,  quickly.  I  know 
the  way  back  to  the  trail.  Moosh!"  he  cried  at 
the  dogs,  which  had  also  caught  the  scent  of  the 
fire,  and  would  have  turned  toward  it. 

Dan  knew  that  Jules  would  follow  after,  pres- 
ently, when  he  had  performed  the  duty  assigned  to 
him,  for  the  trapper  could  make  greater  speed 
alone  on  his  snowshoes  than  they  were  making 
with  the  dogs  and  sledge.  Indeed,  they  both  might 
have  made  better  time  across  the  mountains  with- 
out that  impediment  but  for  the  fact  that  without 
it  they  might  never  have  succeeded  in  making  the 
crossing  at  all,  and  if  disabled,  must  have  perished 
without  the  huskies,  and  the  blankets,  and  provi- 
sions, and  tools  that  were  packed  on  the  sled. 

Dan  did  know  the  way  back  to  the  trail,  and 
found  it;  and  the  fury  of  the  wind  lessened  for  a 
time,  so  that  he  made  fairly  good  headway  down 
the  mountain  Nor  did  he  give  another  thought  to 
Jules  until  he  had  covered  more  than  another  mile, 
and  paused  to  speak  to  his  companion,  whom  he 
supposed  was  directly  behind  him  by  that  time. 

But  Jules  was  not  there,  and  he  stopped,  amazed 
that  he  was  not.  But  even  as  he  hesitated,  and 
was  on  the  point  of  turning  backward,  the  figure 
of  Jules  loomed  through  the  snow,  like  some  gi- 
gantic thing  approaching. 

"C'est  bon,"  he  said,  without  pausing,  and 


98  UP  AGAINST  IT 

shouted  at  the  dog-s.  A  moment  later  he  added: 
"Tout  a  la.  They  all  dere,  m'sieu.  Je  sui  con- 
tent. Non?  Et  vous?  They  sleep.  We  mak" 
speed  now,  down  de  mountain." 

It  was  difficult  to  talk  in  that  wind.  Dan  heard 
only  sufficient  to  understand  that  Jules  had  found 
Wadleigh  and  the  others  sleeping,  and  had  Hurried 
on. 

It  was  daylight  when  they  staggered  across  the 
barren  stretch  that  was  between  the  foot  of  the 
mountain  and  Magician,  but  lights  still  gleamed 
from  several  windows,  when,  at  last,  they  began 
to  pass  by  the  outlying  houses  of  the  town. 

Straight  toward  the  center  of  it  Dan  led  the  way, 
so  exhausted  that  he  could  barely  keep  up  the  ef- 
fort; and  he  made  the  last  turn  which  would  bring 
them  directly  to  the  building  where  the  clerk's 
office  was  located,  and  where  he  expected  to  find 
his  friend,  Sam  Sutherland,  on  duty,  at  the  office* 
of  registry. 

But  as  he  made  that  last  turn  he  stopped;  and 
he  put  up  one  hand  to  his  eyes  as  if  to  rub  away 
the  vision  of  the  thing  he  thought  he  saw— a  heap 
of  smouldering  ashes  above  the  ruin  of  what  had 
been  the  building  he  sought. 

The  fire  had  raged  early  on  the  preceding  day, 
evidently,  or  during  the  night  before  that,  for  the 
driving  snow  of  last  night's  storm  had  encroached 
upon  the  rapidly  cooling  ashes  in  many  places*. 
Dan  turned  wearily  away  from  the  sight  of  it.  ; 

A  man  stepped  outside  of  a  door  across  the  way 
and  called  to  him,  then  hurriedly  retreated  inside 
again,  for  the  cold  was  of  the  kind  that  bites  like 
an  animal.  The  dogs  had  already  stretched  them- 


THE  TRAGEDY  AT  MAGICIAN         99 

selves  upon  the  hard  snow,  utterly  exhausted,  but 
Jules  called  sharply  to  them  and  they  got  up  again. 

"You  go,  m'sieu,"  he  said  to  Dan.  "I  come 
back  bimeby,  an'  fin'  you,  apres  I  half  cared  for 
de  dogs.  Sacrrrr-r!  Eet  ees  ver'  mooch  colt." 

Dan  left  him  and  staggered  through  the  door- 
way that  was  pulled  open  for  him  as  he  ap- 
proached it.  The  man  who  had  called  to  him  was 
an  acquaintance.  He  told  his  news  almost  in  a 
breath,  and  Dan  listened  dully. 

"Good  heavens,  man,  do  you  mean  to  tell  me 
that  you  have  crossed  the  pass  from  Janver 
through  the  big  storm  of  last  night?  And  you 
are  alive  to  tell  of  it?  You  were  looking  for  Suth- 
erland, weren't  you?  Poor  chap.  There  isn't 
much  left  of  him,  now.  He  was  burned  up  in  the 
fire,  night  before  last.  We  didn't  know,  till  after- 
ward, that  he  was  inside;  but  we  couldn't  have  got 
him  out  if  we  had  known." 

Dan  sank  down  upon  a  bench  that  was  near  him. 
The  heat  of  the  room,  after  the  intense  cold  and 
the  utter  fatigue  that  he  had  so  long  endured,  over- 
whelmed him  but  he  comprehended  in  a  vague  sort 
of  way  that  his  friend  whom  he  had  crossed  the 
mountain  to  see,  had  perished  in  the  fire  that  had 
destroyed  the  building  in  which  had  been  regis- 
tered all  of  the  records  for  that  part  of  the 
province. 

His  informant  brought  him  a  glassful  of  white 
whiskey  diluted  with  much  water,  and  made  him 
swallow  it,  while  he  went  on  with  his  information. 

"Sam  boozed  too  much,  as  you  know,  Dan,"  he> 
said.  "That  night  there  was  a  card  party  and 
Sam  went  away  about  three  in  the  morning, 


100  UP  AGAINST  IT 

drunker  than  usual.  They  think  he  fell  against 
the  table,  or  something  like  that,  and  overturned 
the  lamp,  and  that  he  did  not  have  sense  enough 
to  pick  it  up  and  chuck  it  outside,  in  the  snow. 
Anyhow,  the  building  was  a  seething  furnace  be- 
fore anybody  knew  what  had  happened.  And 
afterward,  they  didn't  find  very  much  of  him; 
only  just  enough  to  know  that  he  had  been  there. 
Poor  old  Sam.  He  was  a  good  chap  too." 

"And  the  records?"  Dan  asked,  but  without 
particular  interest.  His  utter  weariness  was  too 
profound. 

'  'Records ! ' '  replied  Buxton.  ' ' There  aren't  any 
records,  now." 


CHAPTER  XII 

"I  Will  Stay  Here-and  Fight' ' 

The  white-wheat  whiskey  which  Randall  had 
swallowed,  and  the  information  which  Buxton 
gave  him,  roused  him  from  the  lethargy  into  which 
he  was  falling.  He  started  to  his  feet,  and  then 
sank  down  again  as  Buxton  came  swiftly  toward 
him  and  began  to  remove  the  furs.  Even  Dan's 
snowshoes  were  still  fast  upon  his  feet.  Buxton 
worked  rapidly,  but  silently,  while  Dan  was  re- 
covering his  mental  and  physical  poise,  and  the 
wonderful  recuperative  power  which  Nature  had 
bestowed  upon  Randall  asserted  itself. 

After  a  little  time  Buxton  began  and  kept  up  a 
running  talk  of  immaterial  information  about  the' 
fire,  and  its  consequences,  but  all  the  while  the 
salient  facts  that  Sutherland  was  dead,  and  that 
the  records  had  been  destroyed,  were  uppermost 
in  Randall's  mind. 

All  record  of  the  deeds  which  would  give  to  him 
the  undisputed  right  of  way  over  Magician  pass, 
had  been  burned,  and  the  deeds  themselves,  which 
had  been  recorded,  and  to  which  fact  Sutherland 
alone  might  have  testified,  were  in  the  possession 
of  Wadleigh;  and  Wadleigh  without  doubt  had 
other  deeds  made  out  to  himself,  or  to  the  M.  & 
J.  railroad  company  of  which  he  was  now  the 
president,  signed  with  Randall's  name. 


102  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Forgeries  they  were,  to  be  sure;  but and  that 

small  word  represented  an  uncertainty  which  was 
exceedingly  grave. 

Might  made  right  to  a  great  degree  in  that 
country,  at  that  time.  Saskatchewan  was  almost 
out  of  the  world;  and  Dan  Randall,  with  all  his 
hopes  and  ambitions,  was  in  Saskatchewan. 

"The  wires  are  down  between  here  and  Janver, 
or  I  would  have  telegraphed,"  he  said  to  Buxton, 
presently,  offering  the  first  explanation  of  his^ 
presence  that  he  had  suggested.  "Let  me  under- 
stand you  now,  clearly,  Buxton.  Were  all  the 
records  destroyed?" 

"Everything,  Dan." 

"Then  I  will  tell  you  something  that  you  don't 
know.  Sutherland  had  just  recorded  for  me  the 
documents  which  gave  to  me,  personally,  the  right 
of  way  to  build  a  railroad  over  Magician  pass,  to 
Janver.  I  secured  them  after  a  great  deal  of  dif- 
ficulty, and  at  considerable  expense,  and  I  have 
kept  very  still  about  it  because  I  did  not  wish  the 
information  of  what  I  was  doing  to  leak  out,  until 
it  was  accomplished.  I  did  not  want  the  C.  P.  and 
the  other  big  fellows  to  know  what  I  was  doing 
until  I  was  ready  to  have  them  know  it." 

"Well,  you  can  get  substitutes  for  the  docu-i 
ments,  can't  you,  and  have  them  properly  recorded 
at  Regina?"  Buxton  asked. 

"I  don't  know.  I  doubt  it.  .  .  .  I  think  that  you 
are  my  friend,  Buxton,  and  that  I  can  depend  upon 
you  as  such.  Can  I?" 

"Try  me,  old  chap,"  was  the  hearty  and  instant 
reply.  "There  is  my  hand  on  it.  My  best  effort 
goes  with  it,  if  you  need  me." 


"I  WILL  STAY  HERE-AND  FIGHT"      103 

"Thank  you,  Bux.  I  was  sure  of  it.  Wadleigh 
and  I  have  parted.  Last  night,  at  the  office  in 
Janver,  I  gave  him  a  thrashing,  but  I  did  not  know, 
even  when  I  did  it,  that  he  was  quite  as  bad  as 
he  is.  Wait.  He  has  stolen  every  one  of  the 
documents  which  convey  that  route  over  the  pass 
to  me.  More  than  that,  he  has  now  in  his  posses- 
sion, so  I  am  convinced,  forged  deeds  purporting 
to  be  executed  by  me,  which  will  rob  me  of  it,  if 
they  go  through.  He  started  over  the  pass  before 
I  did,  last  night,  with  Ben  Taggart,  and  Lightfoot 
—and  they  took  with  them  the  man  who  actually 
committed  the  forgeries;  the  man  who  was  the  only 
one  who  could  have  done  it." 

•"Rather  a  mixed-up  mess,  isn't  it,  Dan?    But 
Wadleigh  hasn't  got  in  yet." 

"No.  Jules  and  I  passed  them  at  the  Summit 
house.  Gaffney,  the  forger,  we  found  dead,  at  the 
Pulpit.  He  had  frozen  to  death.  There  isn't  any 
doubt  that  Wadleigh  intended  that  he  should,  and 
took  him  over  the  pass  with  him  for  that  purpose; 
to  get  rid  of  him.  This  fire,  happening  as  it  did, 
supplies  a  remarkable  coincidence,  Buxton.  If  it 
weren't  for  the  fact  that  Wadleigh  made  the  effort 
he  did,  to  get  here,  I  should  be  inclined  to  think 
that  he  might  be,  in  some  way,  responsible  for 
it." 

"Good  lord,  man!  Do  you  mean  that?  If  he 
is " 

"Wait.    We  mustn't  jump  at  conclusions." 

' '  No.  You  are  right.  But  it  will  be  short  shrift 
for  Ace  Wadleigh  if  I  find  out  that  that  is  so.  Sam 
Sutherland  had  his  faults,  but  he  was  my  friend. 
Go  on  Dan.  What  else  is  there  to  tell  me?" 


104  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"I  must  go  south  this  very  day.  Is  the  line 
open  to  Lonecamp?" 

1  'It  was,  until  last  night.  They  had  just  cleared 
it  from  the  last  storm.  But  that  one  last  night 
must  have  filled  it  in  again,  worse  than  ever.  It's 
a  safe  bet  that  there  won't  be  a  wheel  over  the 
road  for  three  or  four  days,  at  the  least." 

"Nevertheless,  I  must  go.  I  must  get  to  Re- 
gina."  . 

"Man  alive,  it's  three  hundred  miles.  It's  fifty 
from  here  to  Lonecamp  by  the  trail,  a  hundred 
more  to  Saskatoon,  and  a  hundred  and  fifty  from 
there  to  Regina.  It  would  all  be  easy  enough  if 
the  railroads  were  open,  but  they're  not.  Besides, 
what  could  you  accomplish  if  you  got  there?  You 
haven't  anything  to  record,  according  to  your  own 
statement.  And  Wadleigh  could  chase  along  after 
you  as  soon  as  the  road  is  open  and  put  it  all  over 
you  with  the  papers  you  say  he's  got.  You  can 
bet  your  life  on  that! ' ' 

"I  can  find  competent  lawyers  there  and  they 
will  tell  me  what  to  do.  I  can  file  affidavits  that 
will  act  as  estoppels.  I  can ' ' 

"You  can  get  yourself  jolly  well  laughed  at, 
Dan,  and  that  is  all  you  can  do,"  Buxton  inter- 
rupted. "You  are  helpless  without  the  documents 
that  you  say  Wadleigh  has  stolen.  You  are  still 
more  so,  because  of  the  forged  documents,  if  the 
forgeries  are  well  done,  as  I  imagine  them  to  be. 
And  you  tell  me  that  the  forger  is  dead.  Besides, 
I  don't  believe  you  could  get  through;  and,  if  you 
did,  there  would  be  a  new  record  office  started 
here  before  you  could  get  back,  and  Wadleigh 
would  get  in  ahead  of  you,  with  what  he's  got,  and 


"I  WILL  STAY  HERE— AND  FIGHT'*      105 

your  fat  would  be  in  the  fire.  And  there's  another 
thing:  Last  night's  storm  was  the  last  of  the  sea- 
son—anyhow, that's  what  the  weather  sharps  say 
about  it.  The  big  thaw  will  hit  us  inside  of  a 
week,  and  the  rains  will  come,  and  Ace  Wadleigh 
will  be  on  the  mountain  the  minute  he  can  get 
there,  if  I  know  anything  about  his  capabilities. 
Stay  here  and  fight  it  out,  man." 

"What  have  I  got  to  fight  with?" 

"Your  hands,  and  your  brains;  your  muscles, 
and  your  intelligence— and  your  friends.  And 
you've  got  a  heap  of  those.  .  .  .  Don't  you  realize, 
Dan,  that  the  big  fellows  are  behind  this?  Ace 
Wadleigh  would  never  have  undertaken  this  busi- 
ness alone.  He's  got  backing,  and  good  backing, 
he  believes,  behind  him,  or  he  wouldn't  have 
touched  it  with  the  end  of  a  bull-whip.  You  can 
bet  your  bottom  dollar  that  old  man  Gregory  is 
engineering  this  deal,  Dan.  Stay  here  and  fight 
it  out." 

"Gregory!"  Randall  repeated,  and  started. 
"The  P.  &  H.  B.?" 

"Surest  thing  you  know.  At  least  that's  the 
way  it  looks  to  me.  If  I  wasn't  convinced  of  it 
before,  I  would  be  now,  after  your  suggestion 
about  the  fire.  Tell  me  this:  Did  Wadleigh  know 
that  you  were  after  that  route  over  the  pass,  until 
after  you  had  got  your  hands  on  it?" 

"No;  nor  anybody  else.  I  worked  that  thing 
entirely  alone." 

"Why?" 

"Because,  in  the  beginning,  I  wasn't  at  all  sure 
that  I  could  get  it,  and  I  didn't  care  to  be  made 
sport  of  if  I  failed.  But  the  minute  I  had  the  thing 


106  UP  AGAINST  IT 

cinched,  I  told  him  about  it,  and  that  I  intended  to 
turn  it  over  to  the  company." 

"I  see.  Then  you  did  not  know  that  the  P.  & 
H.  B.  people  were  only  waiting  for  the  snow  to  dis- 
appear to  start  in  on  that  very  thing,  themselves?" 

"No.  I  had  no  thought  of  such  a  thing.  Cer- 
tainly I  didn't  know  it,  or  guess  it." 

T<Ace  Wadleigh  knew  it." 

"Perhaps." 

"I  know  that  he  did.  He  was  here  just  before 
that  other  storm.  Gregory's  secretary,  Clifford, 
dropped  in  upon  us  the  same  day.  He  had  been 
going  over  their  own  lines,  he  said,  and  came 
around  this  way  from  Carrolton.  The  meeting 
between  them  looked  like  an  accidental  one,  and  I 
would  have  thqught  it  such  if  I  hadn't  been  put 
wise.  They  sat  up  together  nearly  the  whole  night 
at  the  McDougall  house— and  you  can  bet  your 
sweet  life  they  didn't  do  that  for  the  mere  pleas- 
ure they  could  find  in  each  other's  company;  not 
when  one  of  them  works  for  Gregory  and  is  the 
craftiest  little  cuss  that  wasn't  born  an  Indian. 
Sandy  McPherson,  who  is  the  new  clerk  at  the 
McDougall,  and  who  is  an  old  acquaintance  of 
mine,  heard  Clifford  say  to  Wadleigh,  as  the# 
were  bidding  each  other  good-bye  the  next  morn- 
ing, that  he'd  meet  him  here  as  soon  as  the  snow 
melted,  and  go  over  the  pass  with  him.  If  you 
can  see  through  a  millstone  with  a  hole  in  it,  there 
is  one." 

"You're  right,  Buxton,"  said  Dan.  "It  was 
the  same  night  that  Wadleigh  got  back  to  Janver 
from  that  trip  that  I  told  him  about  what  I  had 
done,  and  I  thought  he  received  the  intelligence 


"I  WILL  STAY  HERE- AND  FIGHT"      107 

with  something  like  a  shock.  That  explains  it. 
I  wonder " 

He  stopped  suddenly  and  thrust  a  hand  into  his 
pocket  to  get  the  map  that  he  had  torn  from  the 
wall  in  Wadleigh's  room.  But  it  came  into  con- 
tact with  something  else  that  he  had  forgotten,  and 
he  brought  out  not  only  the  folded  map,  but  also 
the  specie-belt  which  Jules  Legarde  had  taken 
from  the  dead  man's  body,  on  the  mountain. 

Dan  gazed  at  it  an  instant,  then  laid  it  aside. 

"I'll  examine  that  belt,  presently,"  he  said. 
"Jules  took  it  from  the  poor  chap  we  found  at 
Devil's  Pulpit.  Just  now  I  have  got  something 
else  on  my  mind."  He  opened  the  folds  of  the 
map  and  spread  it  across  his  knees,  giving  the  op- 
posite end  of  it  to  Buxton.  Then  he  placed  his 
thumb  and  fingers  upon  it  as  he  had  done  in  Wad- 
leigh's  room  in  Janver.  He  rested  his  forefinger 
upon  Janver,  put  his  thumb  upon  Allerton,  and  his 
little  finger  upon  Magician.  The  north  side  of 
the  map  was  toward  Buxton. 

"Look  at  the  map,  Bux,"  he  said,  his  whole 
mind  intent  upon  the  great  project.  "There  is 
Allerton,  beneath  my  thumb.  The  P.  &  H.  B.  en- 
ters Allerton  from  the  west,  and  strikes  out  south- 
easterly from  there,  around  the  south  spur  of  the 
Badger  range,  and  by  a  crescent  course  finally 
makes  Lonecamp,  which  is  directly  south  of  Ma- 
gician, where  we  are  now.  The  B.  S.  &  L.  S.  is 
building  an  extension  into  Allerton  from  the  north- 
west, and  will  complete  it  and  open  it  this  summer. 
Now  look  northeast  from  Allerton,  to  Carrolton, 
which  is  the  present  terminal  of  the  Manitoba  & 
Juneau,  of  which  I  was  president,  and  which  I  con- 


108  UP  AGAINST  IT 

trolled,  until  yesterday.  We  were  going  to  build 
into  Allerton  this  coming  summer,  as  you  know. 
Now  look  down  along  the  existing  line  of  the  M. 
&  J.  from  Carrolton  to  Janver,  and  thence  follow 
an  imaginary  line  across  Magician  pass  to  Ma- 
gician. Don't  you  see  that  the  cut-off  will  render 
the  present  line  around  through  Rickett's  canyon 
to  Magician  practically  useless  and  that  there  will 
not,  after  that,  be  any  earthly  need  of  building 
into  Allerton  from  Carrolton.  The  outlet  from 
Carrolton  to  the  states  by  way  of  Janver  and  the 
cut-off,  and  through  Magician,  and  Lonecamp,  will 
be  much  shorter  and  better  than  the  projected  one 
to  Allerton,  to  connect  there  with  the  P.  &  H.  B. 

"But  there  is  another  point.  What  is  the  mat- 
ter with  another  cut-off  between  Allerton  and  Jan- 
ver, through  Black  gorge?  Oh,  it  can  be  done. 
I've  been  over  the  ground,  and  I  know.  I'm  an 
engineer,  and  I  ought  to  know.  Allerton  and  Ma- 
gician are  located  directly  west  and  east  of  eacli 
other.  Janver  is  on  a  straight  line  drawn  from 
one  to  the  other,  a  third  of  the  distance  nearer  to 
Magician.  From  Allerton  to  Janver,  around  by 
way  of  Carrolton,  the  distance  is  a  hundred  and 
thirty-four  miles.  The  distance  between  Allerton 
and  Janver  by  Black  gorge  is  about  thirty-five  or 
forty  miles,  as  the  road  would  run.  The  distance 
from  Janver  to  Magician  by  the  present  route 
through  Rickett's  canyon  is  sixty-nine  miles,  but 
the  distance  between  the  same  points,  by  way  of 
the  pass,  will  be  about  eighteen  miles,  including 
the  distance  between  Janver  and  Bluerock.  So,  at 
the  most,  with  those  two  cut-offs  built,  the  haul  be- 
tween Allerton  and  Magician  would  not  exceed 


"I  WILL  STAY  HEEE-AND  FIGHT"      109 

sixty  miles,  whereas  now,  and  with  the  projected 
extension  between  Allerton  and  Carrolton  it  figures 
up  two  hundred  and  three  miles.  There  is  the 
map.  Look  at  it,  Bux." 

"Holy  smoke!"  Buxton  exclaimed.  "You'd 
drain  every  shipment  from  the  northwest  by  the 
B.  S.  &  L.  S. !  You'd  force  the  P.  &  H.  B.  to  aban- 
don, almost,  their  line  around  the  south  spur  of 
the  Badgers  to  Lonecamp,  and  you'd  get  all  of 
the  Carrolton  shipments." 

' ' That  isn't  all,  either,  Bux.  Think  of  the  riches 
we  are  likely  to  uncover  in  that  Black  gorge  proj- 
ect." 

"I  have  thought  of  it.  I  am  wondering,  now, 
about  another  thing  which  perhaps  you  have  not 
thought  about,  Dan." 

"What  is  that?" 

"Why,  man  alive,  you'll  bankrupt  your  own 
property!  You'll  put  the  M.  &  J.  out  of  business 
if  you  do  all  that." 

"In  the  first  place,  Bux,  that  is  precisely  what 
I  intend  to  do;  and  in  the  second  place,  the  M.  & 
J.  is  not  my  property,  now.  It  has  been  stolen 
from  me,  lock,  stock  and  barrel." 

' '  But  your  stock,  man.  They  couldn't  steal  that 
from  you." 

"Yes,  they  could-and  did." 

"How?" 

"For  reasons  of  my  own,  I  had  placed  every- 
thing in  the  name  of  Joyce  Maitland.  It  is  enough 
for  me  to  say,  at  present,  and  you  will  understand, 
when  I  tell  you  that  she  has  thrown  all  of  it  into 
the  lap  of  Ace  Wadleigh.  .  .  .  There,  there;  I  see 
what  is  on  your  mind  to  say;  but  don't  say  it. 


110  UP  AGAINST  IT 

The  conspiracy  has  been  a  deliberate  one,  well 
planned,  and  perfectly  executed.  I  had  sufficient 
proof  of  it,  yesterday.  What  you  have  told  me 
in  regard  to  the  meeting  between  Clifford  and 
Wadleigh,  and  the  probable  interest  of  Gregory 
and  the  P.  &  H.  B.,  in  the  matter,  is  only  an  added 
circumstance.  Old  Lionel  Gregory  is  Miss  Mait- 
land's  relative,  and  Clifford,  his  secretary,  would 
readily  become  her  slave  if  she  asked  it  of  him. 
A  moment  ago  you  twice  said  to  me,  'Stay  here  and 
fight.'  Well,  I  will  stay  here  and  fight— to  a  fin- 
ish. Do  you  want  to  go  into  the  fight  with  me, 
Bux?" 

"I  do— if  you  will  take  me.  I  haven't  much 
money,  you  know." 

"You've  got  brains,  and  pluck;  and  you're  loyal 
and  square.  And  I  can  find  the  money.  I  know 
how  to  do  that.  Will  you  stick?" 

"To  the  last  ditch,  Dan." 

"Knowing  that  Joyce  Maitland  is  opposed  to 
us?  Knowing  that  she  is  with  the  other  side?" 

"I'll  stick,  Dan,  until  the  end,"  was  the  slow 
reply,  although  Buxton's  face  paled  somewhat 
as  he  said  it. 

Their  hands  were  still  clasped  in  the  closing  of 
the  compact  when  the  door  was  thrown  open,  and 
Jules  Legarde  glided  into  their  presence.  He 
closed  the  door  quickly,  and  stood  still,  with  his 
back  against  it. 

"M'sieu,  hide  yourself,  bientot— prompt.  Those 
men,  Wadleigh  et  Taggarrr,  are  ici.  They  comme 
to  thees  place  now,  to  geet  you,  m'sieu.  They  haf 
been  to  de  police  and  swear  you  keel  de  bum— 
heem  we  find.  They  say  you  robbed  also  hees  dead 


"I  WILL  STAY  HERE-AND  FIGHT"      111 

body.  I  not  heear  mooch.  Mais,  they  breeng  de 
body  avec  them,  to  Magicienne.  Voila!  Thejf 
mak'  de  charge  avoir  de  dessus.  The  officers  they 
come,  maintenant.  You  hide.  They  tak'  moi, 
too,  mabby,  but  Juler  not  care.  YoUa  tout!" 


Two  Packets  in  Oilskins 

Dan  Randall  started  to  his  feet  when  Jules  burst 
into  the  room,  and  he  understood  instantly  what 
had  happened.  He  could  see  it  all,  intuitively, 
as  plainly  as  if  he  had  seen  it  actually. 

One  of  the  three  men  at  the  Summit  house  had 
seen  Randall  passing,  or  had  discovered  Jules 
when  he  returned  to  spy  upon  them.  Taggart,  or 
Lightfoot,  had  gone  back  to  the  Devil's  Pulpit  to 
find  out  if  Gaffney  had  been  rescued,  or,  in  case 
he  had  perished,  if  the  body  had  been  discovered. 
Wadleigh  had  been  astute  enough  to  turn  what 
might  have  been  a  calamity  for  him  into  an  ad- 
vantage. They  had  found  that  Gaffney's  pouch- 
belt  was  missing,  and  that  the  body  had  been  cov- 
ered up  with  the  cord- wood  that  was  stored  in  the 
hollow— and  so  Wadleigh  had  brought  the  dead 
Gaffney  into  Magician  with  him,  had  taken  the 
body  straight  to  the  mounted  police,  to  charge 
Randall  and  Jules  with  the  crime  of  murder.  The 
irony  of  the  circumstance  was  in  the  fact  that  not 
one  of  them  had  suspected  that  Gaffney  had  worn 
such  a  belt  until  it  was  too  late  to  possess  them- 
selves of  it. 

The  belt,  which  Randall  had  not  yet  examined, 
was  upon  a  chair  beside  him  when  Jules  gave  the 


TWO  PACKETS  IN  OILSKINS         113 

alarm.  With  a  quick  act  of  inspiration,  he  seized 
it,  doubled  it  in  his  grasp,  and  tossed  it  upon  the 
top  of  a  row  of  shelves  that  lined  one  side  of  the 
room.  It  dropped  down  behind  some  pasteboard 
boxes  which  were  there,  and  was  hidden  from 
view.  Buxton  nodded,  understandingly.  Then 
Randall  sprang  to  the  door,  and  put  the  bar  across 
it.  He  seized  Jules  by  the  arm  and  drew  him 
toward  the  back  of  the  room,  motioning  to  Bux- 
ton to  follow,  and  to  listen. 

"You  must  go,  Jules,  not  I,"  he  said,  rapidly. 
"You  must  get  back  to  Janver.  It  must  be  done, 
and  you  can  do  it.  Can  you  do  it?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu.  But  I  will  go  alone.  Without 
the  chiens.  But  why? ' ' 

"You  must  get  everything  that  is  mine  out  of 
the  house  where  I  have  been  living,  and  move 
all  of  it  to  the  stone  house  at  White  Lake.  And 
you  must  take  Yvonne,  and  go  there  to  live.  But 
most  of  all,  you  must  find  a  way  to  get  from  my 
office,  on  the  square,  the  small  leather  satchel 
which  I  brought  back  with  me  to  Janver,  night 
before  last.  I  left  it  on  the  floor  behind  the  door 
in  the  little  room,  off  from  the  big  office-room,  and 
I  had  totally  forgotten  it  until  this  moment,  when 
I  am  in  danger  of  arrest.  It  is  that  fact  that  has 
brought  it  to  mind.  It  is  for  that  satchel  that  I 
send  you  back.  Get  it  at  all  hazards,  and  keep 
it  safely  for  me.  Go,  now."  Dan  opened  the  back 
door  of  the  building,  and  Jules  passed  outside, 
murmuring  as  he  went: 

"Oui,  m'sieu.    Eet  ees  fait  accompli." 

There  was  a  loud  summons  at  the  front  door  as 
Randall  and  Buxton  turned  back  again  into  the 


114  UP  AGAINST  IT 

room,  and  the  latter  lifted  his  eyes  to  Dan's  in- 
quiringly. 

"I  am  going  to  give  them  something  to  arrest 
me  for— something  real,  Buxton,' '  Dan  said,  speak- 
ing rapidly.  "I  will  open  the  door.  You  keep 
close  to  me.  I  shall  attack  Wadleigh  the  instant 
he  gets  within  my  reach.  But  not  for  the  purpose 
of  hurting  him.  Don't  get  that  idea  into  your  head. 
There  isn't  a  particle  of  animus  about  this.  It  is 
all  craft.  Just  craft,  Buxton.  I  want  to  get  those 
forged  deeds  away  from  him.  .  .  .  All  right!  In 
a  moment!"  he  called  out,  loudly,  to  those  outside 
the  door,  who  had  redoubled  their  banging  upon 
it.  "I  know  where  he  carries  papers,  and  such 
things,  when  he  has  them  with  him.  I  shall  maul 
him,  and  tear  some  of  his  clothing  off  of  him,  be- 
fore the  others  can  prevent  it.  If  you  should  see 
a  garment,  or  a  package  of  papers  or  anything 
of  the  sort,  fly  across  the  room,  GET  IT;  and  keep 
it,  somehow.  If  I  can  get  those  forged  deeds  away 
from  him,  we  will  be  on  even  ground." 

Randall  stepped  forward,  swiftly,  toward  the 
door.  He  threw  down  the  bar,  and  opened  it. 
Wadleigh  stood  there,  close  beside  the  red-coated 
representative  of  the  law.  Behind  the  two  loomed 
Taggart;  and  beyond  him  Lightfoot  stood  with 
folded  arms. 

As  Dan  had  anticipated,  it  was  V7adleigh  who 
pushed  forward  when  the  door  was  opened.  Ran- 
dall used  all  of  his  great  strength  in  the  consum- 
mation of  what  followed,  and  so  quickly  did  he 
act  that  there  was  not  time  nor  opportunity  for 
interference. 

He  seized  Wadleigh  and  jerked  him  into  the 


TWO  PACKETS  IN  OILSKINS         115 

room;  he  kicked  the  heavy  door  shut  in  the  faces 
of  the  others.  He  tore  at  Wadleigh's  furs,  ripping 
the  hood  and  the  coat  off  of  him  in  a  twinkling. 
Then  he  struck  him  full  in  the  face  with  the  pad 
of  his  hand,  and  as  Wadleigh  fell,  Dan  reached 
down  inside  of  the  torn  waistcoat,  seized  a  pack- 
age that  was  there,  wrapped  in  oilskin,  and  hurled 
it  toward  the  far  end  of  the  room.  And  in  the 
confusion  incident  to  the  attack,  together  with  the 
blinding  blow  in  the  face,  Wadleigh  was  totally 
unaware  of  his  loss. 

Dan  released  his  hold  at  the  same  moment  he 
struck  the  blow  and  secured  the  packet  of  papers. 
He  threw  Wadleigh  backward  and  away  from  him, 
and  into  the  grasp  of  the  red-coated  policeman 
who  had  opened  the  door  again  and  entered  the 
store. 

Dan  straightened  himself,  folded  his  arms,  and 
said,  coolly: 

"I  am  sorry,  Sergeant  Hurley.  I'm  afraid  that 
I  did  not  realize  the  fact  that  you  were  present. 
But  the  attack  was  not  without  provocation,  Ser- 
geant. Wadleigh  has  broken  every  law  of  friend- 
ship with  me,  and  last  night,  he,  with  Taggart  and 
Lightfoot,  committed  a  deliberate  murder. 
He " 

"You're  an  infernal  liar,  Randall,  an*  you  know 
it!"  Taggart  interrupted. 

"Silence!"  ordered  the  policeman.  "Mr.  Ran- 
dall, you  are  under  arrest.  There  are  sworn 
charges  fiTecL  against  you— and  I  fear  that  just 
now  you  have  given  occasion  for  further  charges, 
for  an  apparently  unprovoked  assault  upon  Mr. 
Wadleigh." 


116  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Wadleigh,  who  had  been  assisted  to  his  feet  by 
Buxtpn,  and  who  was  now  readjusting  his  torn 
clothing,  cried  out  suddenly,  and  sprang  like  an 
enraged  cat  toward  Randall;  but  he  was  thrust 
back  again  by  the  sturdy  sergeant. 

"He  has  robbed  me,  as  well  as  assaulted  me!'* 
Wadleigh  called  out,  white  with  fury. 

"The  man  is  mad,"  said  Dan,  shrugging  his 
shoulders. 

"He  has  stolen  my  papers— my  deeds.  I  had 
them,  wrapped  in  oilskin,  in  this  pocket.  He  took 
them  when  he  attacked  me  just  now,"  Wadleigh 
insisted;  and  he  began  at  once  to  search  about  on 
the  floor  for  the  packet.  Lightfoot  and  Taggart, 
and  even  Buxton,  assisted  him.  They  pulled  out 
boxes  and  peered  behind  them.  They  sprang  over 
the  counter  that  occupied  one  side  of  the  long 
room,  and  searched  on  the  floor  behind  it.  They 
looked  along  the  shelves  where  the  packet  might 
have  been  hurled  in  the  struggle.  And  then  Bux- 
tpn uttered  a  shout  that  called  their  united  atten- 
tion toward  him. 

He  was  standing  before  the  open  door  of  the 
huge  stove  that  heated  the  big  room.  He  pointed 
at  the  fire  that  burned  within  it,  fiercely  hot. 
Something  was  there,  blazing  merrily,  and  curling 
beneath  the  great  heat,  and  it  needed  only  a  glance 
to  determine  that  it  had  once  been  a  packet  of 
papers  wrapped  in  oilskin  that  was  now  being  so 
rapidly  consumed. 

Wadleigh  leaped  forward  as  if  to  thrust  his  hand 
into  the  fiery  furnace.  He  withdrew  it,  scorched. 
He  seized  upon  an  iron  poker  and  attempted  to 
throw  the  burning  papers  from  the  fire  with  it— 


TWO  PACKETS  IN  OILSKINS         117 

and  failed.  He  grasped  a  pair  of  tongs  from  the 
zinc  under  the  stove,  and  attempted  to  lift  them 
out,  but  the  object  crumbled,  and  fell  apart,  and 
burned  the  more  fiercely. 

Wadleigh  stared  at  the  sight  of  it,  recovering 
his  coolness,,  and  already  trying  to  plan  how  he 
might  overcome  such  a  disaster.  He  had  no  idea 
that  Randall  suspected  what  the  papers  had  been. 
Taggart  cursed  loudly,  and  roundly,  and  he  rushed 
forward  and  planted  his  huge  fist  squarely  in  Ran- 
dall's face  before  anybody  suspected  his  intention. 

Dan  staggered  backward  under  the  force  of  the 
blow,  which  would  have  stunned  another  man. 

The  act,  and  the  smarting  effect  of  it,  roused 
all  of  the  fury  that  was  latent  in  his  naturally 
violent  temper.  He  forgot  the  surroundings,  and 
the  power  of  the  Northwest  Mounted  Police  which 
was  present  in  the  person  of  Sergeant  Hurley.  He 
was,  on  the  instant,  uncontrollable,  and  beyond  the 
power  of  self-control. 

He  sprang  upon  Taggart,  and  thev  clinched, 
evenly  matched  in  size,  almost  so  in  strength. 
They  rolled  upon  the  floor  tearing  at  each  other, 
Taggart  enveloped  in  his  furs,  Randall  stripped 
down  to  his  house  clothing.  The  others,  even 
Wadleigh— even  the  sergeant— looked  on  in 
amazement  at  the  unlooked-for  struggle  of  the 
two  big  men. 

Then  the  sergeant  made  an  effort  to  separate 
them,  to  tear  them  apart;  but  Taggart 's  foot  dealt 
Hurley  an  unintentional  blow  which  sent  him 
spinning  backward,  across  the  floor. 

Randall  somehow  got  his  right  hand  inside  the 
furs  at  Taggart 's  throat,  and  the  ex-lumberjack's 


118  UP  AGAINST  IT 

jaw  fell  open  as  he  gasped  for  breath.  But  Dan 
only  squeezed  the  harder,  and  Taggart  was  grow- 
ing black  in  the  face  when  the  others  rushed  in 
upon  them  in  a  body,  and  tore  Randall  loose. 

Then  it  was,  when  they  were  endeavoring  to  re- 
store Taggart  to  his  senses,  that  a  second  packet, 
also  wrapped  in  oilskin,  fell  from  Taggart 's  per- 
son to  the  floor,  unnoticed  by  all  save  Sergeant 
Hurley,  who  picked  it  up,  and  dropped  it  into  his 
pouch-bag. 

Why  he  did  that  he  perhaps  could  not  have  told, 
save  only  that  he  wished  to  bring  the  existing 
scene  to  a  close  as  soon  as  possible.  The  packet 
he  had  found  could  wait.  He  turned  toward  Dan, 
who  was  recovering,  slowly,  from  the  effect  of 
his  rage. 

"Randall,  put  on  your  furs  and  come  with  me," 
he  ordered. 

Dan  looked  first  at  him,  then  around  at  Buxton, 
half  stupidly. 

"Go  ahead,  old  chap,"  Buxton  said,  stepping 
forward  and  putting  a  hand  upon  Dan's  shoulder. 
"The  charge,  whatever  it  is,  won't  amount  to  any- 
thing I'll  see  you  through." 

With  a  deep  drawn  sigh  Randall  recovered. 

"Oh,  yes,"  he  said.  "I  had  forgotten.  All 
right,  Buxton,  and  thank  you.  Sergeant  Hurley, 
I  am  at  your  service— and  I  beg  your  pardon,  too, 
for  appearing  to  resist  your  authority.  I  did  not 
mean  it  so." 

"Well,  I'll  tell  you  one  thing  that  7  mean,  Dan 
Randall,"  Taggart  shouted.  "I'll  get  your  ever- 
lastin*  goat  for  this!  Yeh  can  bank  on  that.  I'll 
have  the  courage  out  of  you  first,  and  the  life  out 


TWO  PACKETS  IN  OILSKINS         119 

of  you  before  I'm  done  with  you,  or  my  name's  not 
Ben  Taggart,"  the  bully  panted  at  Dan  from  the 
chair  where  he  was  slowly  recovering  from  the 
effects  of  the  choking  he  had  received. 

Randall  made  no  reply.  He  adjusted  his  furs, 
and,  after  a  moment,  followed  the  sergeant  from 
Buxton's  store. 

Wadleigh  and  Lightfoot  went  along. 

Buxton,  left  alone,  stared  at  the  fire  in  the  stove, 
poked  at  the  cinders,  thoughtfully;  and,  oddly 
enough,  he  chuckled  audibly. 


CHAPTER  XIV 
A  Conspiracy  That  Failed 

No  human  being  not  inured  to  the  intense  cold 
of  the  North,  and  who  had  not  experienced  a  life- 
long training  in  endurance  and  sustained  effort, 
would  have  dared  to  undertake  the  task  that  Ran- 
dall set  for  Jules  Legarde  that  fateful  day.  Much 
less  could  there  have  been  hope  of  success  in  the 
undertaking  for  a  person  less  thoroughly  equipped 
than  he,  for  the  task. 

The  word  "failure"  was  not  contained  in  Jules' 
lexicon.  His  ready  reply  to  any  task  which  his 
beloved  master  might  set  for  him  was,  invariably, 
"Eet  ees  fait  accompli,"  and  his  simple,  direct, 
loyal  soul  could  have  comprehended  no  other 
climax. 

When  he  was  so  summarily  thrust  from  the  rear 
doorway  of  Buxton's  store,  and  commanded  to 
fight  his  way  over  Magician  pass  again,  before  he 
had  been  given  time  to  recover  from  the  great  ef- 
fort of  the  preceding  night,  there  was  no  thought 
in  his  mind  of  the  hardships  to  be  endured,  or  of 
the  fatigue  that  he  must  have  felt  because  of  what 
he  had  already  accomplished.  Over  there,  across 
the  mountains,  were  duties  to  be  performed.  That 
was  all. 

The  dogs  he  did  not  want.  He  knew  that  he 
could  make  the  journey  much  quicker  without 


A  CONSPIRACY  THAT  FAILED        1211 

them,  particularly,  now  that  it  was  daylight.  Jules 
knew  how  to  fight  his  own  way  through  the  snows 
quite  as  well  as  they  did.  For  the  return  he  would 
need  no  tools  nor  emergency  accessories,  such  as 
had  been  necessary  for  the  night-trip,  and  with 
the  m'sieu  to  care  for. 

His  snowshoes  had  been  strapped  to  his  shoul- 
ders when  he  entered  the  store.  He  knelt  beneath 
the  shelter  of  the  shed  and  adjusted  them  as  soon 
as  Buxton  closed  the  door  after  him.  Then,  just 
at  the  moment  when  Randall,  inside  of  the  store, 
seized  Wadleigh  to  tear  the  furs  oif  of  him  in  order 
to  procure  the  packet  of  deeds,  Jules  sped  away 
through  the  crisp  morning  air  toward  the  moun- 
tains. 

Jules  had  fortified  himself  with  food  since  his 
arrival  at  Magician.  His  first  care  had  been  for 
the  dogs;  his  second,  for  himself.  Then,  returning 
to  Buxton's  store,  where  he  knew  he  would  find 
the  m'sieu  awaiting  him,  he  had  come  upon  the 
knowledge  of  the  sworn  charge  which  Wadleigh 
and  the  others  were  making  against  Dan  Randall. 

Now,  when  he  faced  the  journey  across  the 
mountain  pass  again  his  spirits  were  strong,  his 
powers  of  endurance  were  not  in  the  least  im- 
paired, and,  save  for  the  predicament  which  con- 
fronted his  master,  his  heart  would  have  been 
light  and  happy.  For,  was  not  little  Yvonne  over 
there,  at  the  other  side  of  the  mountain,  awaiting 
him? 

As  for  Randall's  predicament— ah,  bah!  That 
would  amount  to  nothing,  he  told  himself.  He 
had  the  same  faith  in  m'sieu  that  he  had  in  him- 
self; and  both  were  infinite. 


122  UP  AGAINST  IT 

It  was  nearly  eleven  o'clock  in  the  forenooni 
when  he  set  out.  By  three  in  the  afternoon,  or 
soon  after  that  hour,  it  would  be  dark  again.  But 
he  only  shrugged  his  massive  shoulders  and  went 
on  the  faster,  when  he  thought  of  that.  He  had 
covered  greater  distances  in  less  time,  and  had 
surmounted  even  more  formidable  obstacles  in  do- 
ing so.  He  was  as  fleet  as  a  hare,  on  snowshoes, 
when  the  going  was  to  his  liking. 

Had  Jules,  by  any  chance,  known  about  the  ad- 
venture that  Joyce  Maitland  had  undertaken  the 
preceding  evening,  he  would  not,  even  then,  have 
hastened  his  movements  by  so  much  as  an  added 
effort.  Long  years  of  experience  had  taught  him 
the  limits  of  sustained  exertion  in  travelling 
through  the  cold  and  snow.  He  had  learned  the 
lesson  of  husbanding  his  strength.  Yet,  he,  as 
well  as  Yvonne,  had  read  between  the  lines  in  the 
open  book  of  love  between  Dan  Randall  and  Joyce. 

Never  once,  as  he  sped  forward,  did  he  pause  for 
breath,  nor  to  look  backward  over  the  path  he  had 
followed.  His  effort  was  On,  on,  on,  with  never 
a  halt  nor  a  hesitation,  and  with  speed  that  was 
amazing. 

Within  the  store,  Burchard  Buxton  stood  quite 
alone,  by  the  time  that  Jules  had  achieved  the  be- 
ginning of  the  pass. 

He  stood  before  the  glowing  fire  in  the  stove, 
looking  down  upon  the  white  cinders  of  the  packet 
that  had  been  consumed,  and  he  chuckled  again 
and  again  at  some  vision  which  seemed  to  shape 
itself  into  definite  outline  among  the  red-hot  coals. 

But  not  for  long.  It  would  have  been  apparent 
to  one  observing  Buxton,  just  then,  that  he  was 


A  CONSPIRACY  THAT  FAILED        123 

determining1  some  perplexing  question,  and  that, 
ere  long,  he  solved  it  to  his  own  satisfaction;  for 
not  many  minutes  had  passed  after  the  departure 
of  Randall  in  the  custody  of  the  sergeant,  before 
he  sought  his  own  furs,  donned  them,  and  went 
out. 

Randall  had  just  completed  the  relation  of  his 
account  of  the  night  on  the  mountain,  and  the  find- 
ing of  Gaffney's  body,  when  Buxton  entered 
the  station.  The  officer  in  charge,  with  Wad- 
leigh's  sworn  statement  in  his  hand,  remarked, 
dryly: 

"Your  account  of  the  affair  seems  sufficiently 
clear,  Mr.  Randall.  Save  for  two  apparently 
minor  circumstances,  it  agrees  with  this  statement 
of  Mr.Wadleigh's." 

"Permission  has  not  been  given  me  to  examine 
that  statement,  sir,"  Randall  replied.  "I  might 
answer  it  more  to  the  point  if  I  knew  what  it  con- 
tained." 

"All  in  good  time." 

"What  are  the  two  circumstances  to  which  you 
refer,  if  I  may  ask?"  Randall  inquired. 

"One  of  them  is  the  absence  from  the  room, 
now,  of  the  man  who  accompanied  you  over  the 
mountain— one  Jules  Legarde.  Where  is  he?" 

"I  have  sent  him  back  to  Janver,  captain." 

"When  did  you  do  that?" 

'  'A  few  moments  only  before  the  arrival  at  Bux- 
ton's  store,  of  Sergeant  Hurley,  to  put  me  under 
arrest." 

"Why  did  you  send  the  man  back  to  Janver  so 
soon  after  he  had  made  the  perilous  passage  across 
the  mountain  with  you?' ' 


124  UP  AGAINST  IT 

'  'Because  of  an  important  matter  that  I  had  for- 
gotten, in  the  haste  of  my  own  departure,  yester- 
day." 

'  'Will  you  state,  under  oath,  that  his  going  away 
at  this  time  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  grave 
charges  that  have  been  laid  against  both  of 
you?" 

"Yes,  sir.  And,  captain,  if  I  may  suggest  a 
thought  to  you,  is  it  likely  that  I  would  have  sent 
him  away,  in  the  face  of  such  charges  as  these,  if 
it  had  occurred  to  me  that  I  would  need  him  to  cor- 
roborate my  statements  to  you?" 

"No.  Are  you  willing  to  tell  me  exactly  what 
the  business  is  that  you  sent  him  upon?" 

"Yes."  Randall  turned  for  an  instant  toward 
Wadleigh,  and  there  was  the  glint  of  a  fleeting 
smile  in  his  eyes  as  he  continued,  still  addressing 
the  major.  "Mr.  Wadleigh  and  I  have  been  oc- 
cupying the  same  offices,  in  Janver,  as  you  know. 
I  had  only  just  returned  to  Janver,  from  Carrol- 
ton,  when  the  necessity  arose  that  sent  me  here. 
I  had  brought  back  with  me  a  small  satchel,  which 
I  left  behind  the  door  in  my  office.  The  satchel 
contains  letters,  documents,  and  other  personal  ef- 
fects, that  are  valuable  to  me.  They  might  like- 
wise interest  Mr.  Wadleigh,  considering  the  pres- 
ent strained  relations  between  us.  But  they  are 
my  private,  personal  property,  and  I  sent  Jules 
Legarde  to  get  the  satchel.  That  is  the  only  part 
of  his  errand  which  could  interest  any  person 
present  in  this  room." 

"This  dead  man  was  called  Peter  G-affney.  Did 
you  know  him?" 

"No.    I  had  never  even  heard  of  him  until 


A  CONSPIRACY  THAT  FAILED        125 

Jules  Legarde,  in  a  conversation  between  us  be- 
fore we  started  across  the  mountain,  referred  to 
him  as  the  'bum.'  " 

"He  was  still  living,  when  you  found  him  at 
Devil's  Pulpit?" 

"Alive,  but  not  conscious.  He  died,  almost  at 
once.  I  regretted  that  we  attempted  to  revive 
him.  He  recovered  only  sufficiently  to  be  con- 
scious of  suffering.  Then— he  died." 

"Did  you  examine  the  body  of  the  dead  man, 
Mr.  Randall?" 

"No.  I  did  search  through  his  pockets,  if  that 
is  what  you  mean." 

"Did  you  remove  anything  from  them?" 

"I  did  not.  There  was  nothing  to  remove.  If 
Gaffney's  pockets  had  contained  anything  of 
value,  or  of  interest,  it  had  been  removed  before  we 
found  him." 

"Did  you  take  away  a  pouch-belt  which  Gaff- 
ney  is  said  to  have  worn,  strapped  around  his 
waist,  inside  of  his  clothing?" 

"I  did  not.  There  was  such  a  belt,  I  believe. 
Jules  discovered  it  after  I  had  gone  through  the 
dead  man's  pockets  and  found  them  empty.  He 
cut  it  from  the  body,  and  brought  it  to  me." 

"What  did  you  do  with  it?" 

"I  threw  it  from  me.  I  could  not  say  exactly 
where  it  fell.  Doubtless  a  careful  search  would 
rediscover  it."  Dan  did  not  regard  it  as  neces- 
sary, under  the  circumstances,  to  state  exactly 
when  and  where  he  had  thrown  away  the  belt. 

"Do  you  mean  that  you  threw  it  away  without 
having  examined  it,  Mr.  Randall?" 

"I  do  mean  exactly  that.    I  felt  of  it,  on  the 


126  UP  AGAINST  IT 

outside,  discovered  that  it  contained  no  coin,  and 
decided  that  it  was  empty  and  worthless." 

"But  it  might  have  held  paper  money,  or  docu- 
ments of  value,  eh?" 

"It  might  have.  I  cannot  say  as  to  that.  I  did 
not  search.  But,  considering  the  general  appear- 
ance of  the  m*n  who  had  worn  it,  I  should  regard 
it  as  extremeiy  doubtful  that  he  carried  anything 
of  value  on  his  person." 

"Will  you  swear  that  Jules  Legarde  has  not 
that  belt  in  his  possession?" 

"Yes,  sir.  I  will  swear  that  he  did  not  have  it 
in  his  possession  for  more  than  a  moment,  that  he 
passed  it  directly  to  me  as  soon  as  he  had  removed 
it  from  the  body,  and  that  his  hands  did  not  again 
touch  it.  Also,  that  I  threw  the  belt  away  from 
me,  as  I  have  stated,  and  that  Jules  does  not  know, 
even  now,  that  I  did  so,  for  he  did  not  see  the  act. 
And  now,  sir,  will  you  permit  me  to  make  a  further 
statement  in  connection  with  the  finding  of  Peter 
Gaffney,  at  Devil's  Pulpit?" 

"Certainly.    What  is  it?" 

"It  is  not  likely  that  Mr.  Wadleigh,  or  Mr.  Tag- 
gart,  or  the  'breed'  who  is  called  Lightfoot,  will 
deny  that  they  took  Gaffney  over  the  pass  with 
them.  They  cannot  deny  that  the  man  was  im- 
perfectly clad  for  such  an  adventure,  and  that  his 
life  was  as  good  as  sacrificed  the  moment  they  per- 
mitted him  to  start  out  with  them  on  such  a  jour- 
ney. Gaffney 's  death  was  the  result  of  exposure. 
You  know  what  Magician  pass  is  like,  as  well  as  I 
do,  or  better,  on  such  a  night  as  last  night  was." 

The  red-coated  official  nodded  his  head  with 
emphasis.  Randall  went  on: 


"If  any  person  other  than  himself  is  responsi- 
ble for  his  death,  it  is  the  man,  or  the  men,  who 
permitted  him  to  start  on  that  journey.  I  quite 
agree  with  the  charge,  as  made  in  this  case,  inso- 
far as  the  word  murder  is  used.  But  the  charge 
should  apply  to  the  men  who  took  him  to  Devil's 
Pulpit;  not  to  those  who  found  him  there,  dying." 

The  grizzled  official  in  the  red  coat  smiled 
grimly.  He  leaned  partly  across  the  low  table  at 
which  he  was  seated,  and  began  slowly  to  remove 
some  paper  wrappings  from  an  article  that  he  held 
in  his  hand.  Randall  watched  him  with  interest, 
for  he  had  no  notion  what  the  package  might  con- 
tain. 

After  a  moment  a  sheathless  hunting-knife  was 
revealed,  and  the  captain,  after  lifting  it  in  his 
hand  and  balancing  it  for  a  moment,  extended  it 
toward  Randall. 

"Take  this  in  your  hand,  look  at  it  closely,  and 
tell  me  if  you  recognize  it,  Mr.  Randall,"  he  said. 

Dan  accepted  it,  held  it  before  his  eyes,  studied 
it  carefully,  then  laid  it  down  upon  the  table.  In- 
stead of  replying  directly  to  the  officer,  he  turned 
half  around  and  looked  at  Wadleigh,  then  at  Tag- 
gart,  and 'then  at  Lightfoot.  Then  he  returned 
his  gaze  to  the  red-coated  official. 

"Well,  sir?"  the  officer  asked. 

"I  recognized  the  hunting  knife  the  instant  you 
removed  the  wrapping  from  it,"  Randall  replied. 
"It  is  one  that  formerly  belonged  to  me.  I  gave 
it  to  Mr.  Wadleigh,  several  months  ago.  I  have 
not  seen  it  since.  May  I  ask  what  the  hunting 
knife  has  to  do  with  the  present  inquiry?" 

"It  was  found  in  the  body  of  the  dead  man.   He 


128  UP  AGAINST  IT 

had  been  stabbed  through  the  heart  with  it,"  was 
the  slow  reply. 

' '  Precisely, ' '  Randall  said,  quickly.  ' '  The  dead 
man  had  been.  The  living  man  had  not  been 
stabbed.  Nor  could  the  knife  have  been  used 
upon  him  until  hours  after  he  was  dead.  I  sus- 
pected something  of  this  sort,  sir,  the  moment  you 
unwrapped  that  paper.  I  assume  that  this  is  the 
other  circumstance  to  which  you  referred  a  little 
while  ago.  Is  it  so?" 

"Yes/'  !.  V! 

"Then,  sir,  you  need  only  to  examine  the 
weapon,  to  convince  yourself  of  the  truth  of  what 
I  say." 

"I  have  examined  it,"  the  officer  said. 

Dan  Randall,  forgetful  for  the  moment  that  he 
was  a  prisoner  under  charges,  wheeled  upon  his 
accusers,  stared  at  them,  one  after  another,  and 
then  turned  abruptly  back  again. 

"A  moment  ago  I  might  have  charged  Ace 
Wadleigh  with  instigating  this  attack  upon  me," 
he  said;  "but  he  is  much  too  smart  to  have  made 
such  a  blunder  as  this  one  is.  Taggart  has  too 
much  sense,  too,  to  father  such  a  fool-effort  to  cre- 
ate a  murder  charge.  And  one  would  suppose 
that  Lightfoot's  training  would  have  kept  him 
from  doing  so.  But,  sir,  it  is  as  plain  as  day  that 
one  of  the  three  used  that  knife  upon  the  body  of 
Peter  Gaffney.  Not  while  he  was  alive.  Not 
while  the  body  still  remained  at  Devil's  Pulpit. 
But  since  it  has  been  brought  here,  to  Magi- 
cian. What  is  your  own  opinion  of  the  matter, 
sir?" 

"My  own  opinion  need  not  be  stated  at  the  pres- 


A  CONSPIRACY  THAT  FAILED        129 

ent  time,  Mr.  Randall.  It  is  sufficient  that  there 
is  not  enough  foundation  for  the  charge  that  has 
been  made  against  you  to  hold  you.  Not  only 
your  own  relation  of  the  circumstances,  but  this 
sworn  statement  that  I  hold  in  my  hand,  exoner- 
ates you.  You  are  discharged  from  custody,  so 
far  as  the  death  of  Peter  Gaffney  is  concerned. 
There  is  still  another  charge  against  you,  however. 
I  will  take  that  up  presently." 

' '  Very  well,  captain.    I  thank  you.' ' 

"Before  we  dismiss  the  present  question,"  the 
grizzled  old  captain  of  the  N.  W.  M.  P.  continued, 
"1  have  one  more  thing  to  say  concerning  it.  I 
address  each  of  you  three  white  men,  in  saying 
what  I  do." 

"Very  well,  sir,"  Dan  replied.  Wadleigh  and 
Taggart  remained  silent.  Indeed,  their  continued 
silence  during  the  examination  had  surprised  Dan 
throughout  it. 

"The  charge,  the  methods  followed  in  making 
it,  the  haste  made  by  both  parties  in  crossing  the 
pass  last  night,  the  scene  which  occurred  at  Bux- 
ton's  store  a  little  while  ago— the  entire  list  of  cir- 
cumstances, in  fact,  suggest  to  me  that  there  is  dis- 
tinct animus  behind  this  affair.  It  is  not  within 
my  province,  however,  to  investigate  that.  But  it 
is  within  my  province,  and  it  is  also  my  duty,  to 
say  this:  I  do  not  think,  Mr.  Randall,  that  you 
should  hold  either  Mr.  Wadleigh,  or  Mr.  Taggart, 
accountable,  wholly,  for  this  charge  against  you 
which  I  have  now  dismissed.  It  so  happens  that 
I  personally  saw  that  hunting-knife  in  the  posses- 
sion of  the  'breed,'  Lightfoot,  three  weeks  ago,  in 
Janver.  I  quite  agree  with  you  in  your  opinion 


130  UP  AGAINST  IT 

that  neither  Mr.  Wadleigh  nor  Mr.  Taggart,  even 
had  they  been  so  disposed,  would  have  committed 
such  a  blunder  as  the  presence  of  that  blade  in  the 
dead  body  of  Gaffney  would  suggest.  Personally, 
I  doubt  their  disposition  to  do  so. 

"But"— the  captain  leaned  forward,  partly 
across  the  table  again— "there  can  be  no  doubt 
that  Lightfoot  could  explain  the  circumstance  of 
the  knife,  if  he  cared  to  do  so.  The  whole  matter 
is  up  to  you,  Mr.  Randall.  If  you  care  to  make  a 
charge  against  Lightfoot,  I  will  hold  him  for  trial. 
Otherwise " 

"Let  him  go,  captain, ' '  Randall  interrupted.  ' ' I 
might  suggest  that  he  was  only  a  tool,  who  had 
blundered  in  carrying  out  his  instructions;  but  I 
could  not  prove  it.  If  any  inquiry  at  all  should 
follow  upon  this  one,  it  should  originate  with  the 
proper  authorities,  and  should  deal  only  with  Gaff- 
ney's  presence  on  the  mountain,  and  with  the  fact 
that  he  was  deserted,  while  still  alive,  at  Devil's 
Pulpit." 

The  captain  tapped  the  affidavit  with  the  tips  of 
his  fingers. 

"That  is  included  in  this  sworn  statement,"  he 
said.  "It  appears,  here,  that  Gaffney  had  fool- 
ishly started  out  alone,  to  cross  the  pass,  that  the 
deponents  came  upon  him  after  they  had  entered 
the  defile,  and  that  they  had  no  other  course  at  the 
time  than  to  take  him  with  them,  and  that,  when 
they  left  him  at  the  pulpit,  they  were  convinced 
that  he  would  be  comparatively  safe  until  their  re- 
turn; also,  that  they  provided  him  with  blankets, 
fire,  and  food.  To  have  brought  him  on,  across 
the  mountain,  would  have  meant  certain  death  to 


A  CONSPIRACY  THAT  FAILED        131 

him.  Have  you  anything  to  say  as  to  all  that,  Mr. 
Randall?" 

' '  Nothing,  sir. ' '  Randall  realized  how  useless  it 
would  be  to  attempt  denial  of  those  false  state- 
ments. 

"You  have  the  power  to  make  a  request  of  the 
government  that  such  an  investigation  as  you  sug- 
gest shall  be  made." 

"I  do  not  care  to  exert  it,  captain." 

The  grizzled  veteran  nodded.  He  motioned  to- 
one  of  his  men  who  was  in  the  room. 

"Take  Lightfoot  away  until  I  have  opportunity 
to  examine  him  alone,"  he  ordered.  To  the  oth- 
ers, he  added:  '  'I  cannot  permit  what  he  has  done 
to  pass  entirely  unnoticed."  Then,  when  Light- 
foot,  without  a  protest,  had  been  taken  from  the 
room,  he  addressed  Wadleigh. 

"Mr.  Randall  attacked  you,  in  Buxton's  store," 
he  said.  "Sergeant  Hurley,  Mr.  Buxton,  and 
Mr.  Taggart,  saw  him  do  so.  Randall  is  not 
likely  to  deny  the  act.  Sergeant  Hurley  has  the 
power  to  press  the  charge  against  him,  but  it  does 
not  become  his  duty  to  do  so,  unless  you  require 
it.  At  the  time  of  the  attack,  you  made  the  state- 
ment that  Randall  had  robbed  you  during  the 
struggle.  What  are  your  wishes  in  regard  to  this 
matter,  Mr.  Wadleigh?" 

Ace  Wadleigh  stepped  forward  quickly. 

All  the  craft  and  subtlety  of  which  he  was  mas- 
ter had  returned  to  him.  He  had  been  silent  so 
far,  because  he  had  paid  little  or  no  attention  to 
what  was  said.  He  had  been  thinking,  planning, 
plotting,  scheming,  all  unmindful  of  what  was  go- 
ing on  around  him.  He  was  cool,  complacent, 


132  UP  AGAINST  IT 

self-contained,  and  eminently  resourceful,  again. 
He  had  foreseen  what  was  coming,  and  was  pre- 
pared. 

"  Captain  Badmington,"  he  said,  with  a  slow 
smile,  "I  will  make  no  charge  against  Mr.  Ran- 
dall. I  most  earnestly  request  Sergeant  Hurley 
not  to  do  so.  ...  Mr.  Taggart  feels  the  same  way 
concerning  a  subsequent  incident  at  the  store,  I 
am  sure.  I  also  wish  to  withdraw  the  statement 
I  made  concerning  a  package  of  papers  which  I  lost 
at  the  time,  and  which,  in  the  struggle,  was  hurled 
through  the  open  door  of  the  stove,  into  the  fire, 
and  destroyed.  I  can  understand,  now,  that  that 
incident  was  the  result  of  accident.  All  in  good 
time  I  will  be  able  to  establish  the  fact  of  my  pos- 
session of  those  papers,  of  my  ownership  of  them, 
and  of  their  contents.  Will  you  please  take  cog- 
nizance of  what  I  say  in  that  regard?" 

"Yes,"  the  officer  replied. 

"Also,  publicly,  I  apologize  to  Mr.  Randall  for 
the  assertion  I  made  that  he  had  robbed  me. 
Likewise,  I  am  now  convinced  that  Randall's 
statements  concerning  the  death  of  Gaffney  are 
substantially  correct.  I  ask,  if  you  please,  that 
the  entire  matter  be  dismissed— including  that  one, 
whatever  it  may  be,  against  Lightfoot." 

The  old  captain  smiled  behind  his  mustache  and 
beard.  He  shot  one  quick  and  comprehensive 
glance  at  Buxton;  and  Buxton  nodded,  slightly. 

"Dismissed,"  the  captain  said,  shortly.  "Light- 
foot  will,  however,  remain  in  custody  until  noon, 
to-morrow.  That's  all." 


CHAPTER  XV 
Dan  Randall's  Error 

Dan  Randall  returned  with  his  friend  Buxton  to 
the  store. 

It  was  not  the  habit  to  lock  doors  in  Magician. 
Buxton,  when  he  went  outside  to  seek  Randall,  had 
merely  closed  the  door  after  him,  nor  had  he 
waited  to  seek  the  pouch-belt  of  the  dead  Gaffney, 
which  Dan  had  hurled  to  its  hiding  place  behind 
the  pasteboard  boxes  along  the  topmost  shelf.  He 
considered  that  to  be  as  safely  hidden  where  it 
was,  as  in  another  place. 

Two  customers  had  entered  the  store  while  he 
was  absent,  and  had  waited.  Time  was  the  least 
valuable  of  assets  in  that  climate,  after  a  storm 
like  that  one  of  the  preceding  night.  Two  or  three 
acquaintances  had  dropped  in,  also,  to  keep  warm, 
and  to  chat.  Their  presence  would  have  pre- 
cluded further  intimate  conference  between  Ran- 
dall and  Buxton,  for  the  time  being,  even  had  Ran- 
dall gone  inside  with  his  friend. 

But,  during  the  five  minutes'  walk  between  the 
barracks  and  the  store,  they  had  talked  rapidly. 
Randall  asked: 

"Bux,  when  I  tore  that  packet  of  deeds  away 
from  Ace,  and  chucked  it  toward  you,  or  tried  to, 
did  I  throw  it  into  the  fire?" 

"Must  have,"  was  the  laconic  reply. 


134  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Huh!  Why  didn't  you  yank  'em  out  again? 
Don't  you  think  it  could  have  been  done  in  time  to 
save  them?  Eh?" 

"Oilskin  burns  rather  freely,  Dan.  And  that 
was  a  hot  fire,  if  anybody  should  ask  you  about  it. ' ' 

"I  know.  Still— it  does  seem  as  if  enough  of 
the  deeds  might  have  been  saved  to  prove  what 
they  were.  However,  I  suppose  it  was  all  for  the 
best.  Anyhow,  Ace  Wadleigh  and  I  are  standing 
on  even  ground,  now." 

Buxton  did  not  reply  at  once.    Then  he  said: 

"The  odds,  as  they  stand,  are  rather  in  your  fa- 
vor, don't  you  think,  Dan?" 

"How  so?    It  looks  to  me  like  a  stand-off." 

"Well,  the  people  from  whom  you  secured  the 
patents  and  deeds  will  give  you  new  ones,  won't 
they?" 

"I  don't  know  about  that.  I'm  not  sure  of  it, 
by  any  means,  particularly  since  you  told  mo  about 
the  big  fellows  being  hot-foot  after  that  very  same 
right  of  way.'" 

"You  can  bring  them  into  court,  can't  you,  and 
make  them  swear  that  they  did  grant  you  the  pat- 
ents, and  sell  you  the  property,  and  all  that  sort 
of  thing?" 

"I  don't  know.  The  same  objection  holds- 
provided  that  old  Gregory  and  his  agents  have 
been  after  the  same  property.  There  is  another 
circumstance  to  be  considered,  too." 

"What  one?" 

"Didn't  you  hear  what  Ace  said  to  the  cap- 
tain?" 

"Sure  I  did." 

"Well,  across  the  mountain,  in  Janver,  Ellery 


DAN  RANDALL'S  ERROE  135 

Cuthbert  and  Orme  Crosby  are  no  doubt  prepared 
to  swear  to  any  statements  that  Wadleigh  and 
Taggart  will  make." 

"What  has  that  got  to  do  with  it?" 

"This:  What  good  will  it  do  me  to  establish 
the  fact  that  such  deeds  were  given  to  me,  if,  on 
the  other  hand,  Wadleigh,  Taggart,  Cuthbert,  and 
Crosby  all  swear  that  I  transferred  the  whole  out- 
fit, hook,  line,  bob,  and  sinker,  to  the  company? 
They  are  four  against  one.  The  records  are 
burned.  Poor  old  Sam  was  burned  up  with  them, 
and  he  was-  the  only  man  who  could  have  stood  by 
me  in  that  respect,  in  this  emergency.  And  that 
isn't  all,  either." 

"What  else,  Dan?" 

"The  'what  else'  looks  to  me  like  pretty  nearly 
the  whole  thing,  Buxton." 

"How  so?    What  is  it?" 

"It  happens  to  be  a  young  woman  by  the  name 
of  Joyce  Maitland,"  Randall  replied,  with  slow 
emphasis. 

They  were  within  a  dozen  paces  of  the  store 
steps.  Buxton  stopped  in  his  tracks,  compelling 
Randall  to  stop  also. 

"Do  you  mean  to  tell  me,  Dan,  that  Miss  Mait- 
land will  uphold  the  things  that  those  fellows  will 
say,  and  do,  and  swear  to?  Are  you  such  an  in- 
fernal ass  that  you  don't  know  that  she  cares  more 
for  your  little  finger  than  she  does  for " 

"That  will  be  about  all,  Buxton,"  Dan  inter- 
rupted, coolly.  "I  can't  reckon  with  what  I 
thought,  or  didn't  think;  not  now.  I've  got  to 
look  facts  in  the  face.  I'll  stare  them  out  of  coun- 
tenance if  it  can  be  done.  But,  can  it?" 


136  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"What  do  you  mean  by  'looking  facts  in  the 
face?'  Tell  me  that,"  Buxton  demanded,  hotly. 

"Haven't  I  told  them  to  you  already?" 

"Maybe  you  haven't  told  me  all  of  them.  If 
you  have— well,  you'd  be  several  different  kinds  of 
a  jackass  to  take  for  granted  all  that  you  have 
seemed  to  take." 

"I  didn't  tell  you  quite  all  of  it,  Bux,"  Randall 
replied,  with  infinite  sadness  in  his  voice. 

"Then  tell  me  the  rest  of  it— right  now." 

"I  have  already  told  you  that  I  gave  Wadleigh 
a  thrashing  with  a  leather  quirt  that  hung  in  the 
office.  I  did  not  tell  you  that  while  I  was  holding 
him  with  one  hand  and  thrashing  him  with  the 
other  one,  Joyce  Maitland  came  into  the  office.  I 
did  not  tell  you  that  she  came  up  behind  me,  be- 
fore I  suspected  that  she  was  there,  grabbed  the 
quirt,  yanked  it  out  of  my  hand,  and  struck  me 
with  the  butt-end  of  it,  did  I?" 

'  'No.  You  didn't  tell  me  that.  It  is  hard  to  be- 
lieve, too,  Dan." 

"It's  true,  every  word  of  it." 

"Goon.    What  else?" 

"She  knocked  me  senseless,  that's  all.  When 
I  came  to— I  don't  know  how  long  a  time  it  was; 
two  or  three  minutes,  I  suppose— she  was  still 
there,  with  the  quirt  in  her  right  hand,  butt  fore- 
most. She  seemed  rather  startled  by  what  she  had 
done.  I  suppose  she  thought  for  a  moment  that 
she  had  killed  me." 

"Where  was  Wadleigh?" 

"He  had  gone.  He  had  remained  in  the  room 
long  enough  to  search  my  pockets,  to  abstract  the 
packet  of  deeds,  and  to  substitute  a  fake  package 


DAN  RANDALL'S  ERROR  137 

for  it.  I  suppose  he  called  to  her  to  follow  him 
when  he  ran  away,  but  she  was  probably  too  slow 
in  doing  so  to  suit  him.  Oh,  what's  the  use,  Bux? 
All  of  that  stock  of  mine  stood  in  her  name,  and 
she  gave  Ace  the  power  to  vote  it.  That  was 
enough,  of  itself.  The  rest  of  what  happened  was 
only  a  natural  sequence  to  what  had  already  been 
done." 

Buxton  shook  his  head  slowly,  then  went  on,  in 
silence,  toward  the  store  steps. 

But  Randall  caught  him  by  the  arm  for  yet  an- 
other instance. 

" Listen,  Bux,"  he  said,  incisively.  " There  are 
just  two  things  upon  which  I  am  entirely  deter- 
mined. Ace  Wadleigh  shall  not  win  the  right  of 
way.  That's  one.  Ace  Wadleigh  shall  not  have 
Joyce  Maitland.  That '  s  two.  And  he  shan ' t  have 
her,  not  if  I  have  to  kill  him  to  prevent  it." 

Dan  turned  about  and  strode  away  in  the  direc- 
tion from  whence  they  had  come. 

Buxton  entered  the  store. 

Randall  had  not  gone  far  when  he  turned  about 
and  retraced  his  steps  untillhe  stood  beside  the  still 
smouldering*  debris  of  the  building  wherein  his 
cherished  records  had  been  destroyed;  and  with 
them  the  one  friend  in  all  that  country  who  could 
have  supplied  the  evidence  to  prove  Dan's  owner- 
ship. 

Sad-eyed,  but  sternly,  he  gazed  upon  the  par- 
tial wreck  of  his  ambition,  and  so  was  quite  un- 
conscious of  the  silent  approach  of  another,  who 
came  to  a  stop  only  a  few  paces  distant. 

Presently,  however,  he  sensed  the  nearness  of 
another  person,  and  turned— to  look  upon  the 


138  UP  AGAINST  IT 

mask-like,  but  coldly  handsome  face  of  Ace  Wad- 
leigh. 

For  a  time  which  seemed  longer  than  it  really 
was  the  two  men  stared  into  each  other's  eyes. 
Just  what  the  emotions  of  each  might  have  been 
during  that  brief  interval  it  is  impossible  to  say. 
The  fact  was  that  neither  of  tb^m  expressed  any 
emotion  at  all. 

Wadleigh  was  the  first  to  speak.  He  spoke 
slowly,  coldly,  almost  without  expression,  and 
quite  as  if  he  were  reading  off  the  words  instead 
of  giving  them  original  utterance.— With  implac- 
able resentment,  he  said: 

"I  saw  you  come  here.  I  followed,  because  I 
had  something  to  say  to  you.  It  is  this :  I  have  not 
forgotten,  and  I  will  not  forget,  the  incident  that 
happened  in  my  office  in  Janver  yesterday  after- 
noon." 

Dan  had  intended  not  to  speak  to  Wadleigh;  to 
ignore  the  man.  But  the  reference  to  that  scene 
in  the  office  followed  so  closely  upon  what  he  had 
just  been  saying  to  Buxton  that  he  could  not  re- 
frain from  replying. 

"I  don't  think  that  either  of  us  is  likely  to  for- 
get it,"  he  replied;  and  he  began  to  turn  away,  in- 
tending to  leave  Wadleigh  where  he  was.  But 
Wadleigh  said: 

"Wait  a  moment." 

Dan  waited,  without  speaking. 

"For  every  lash  of  that  whip  I  shall  make  you 
pay  dearly,  and  with  compounded  interest,  before 
I  am  through  with  you,  Randall.  No  doubt  you 
would  have  kept  it  up  until  you  had  killed  me  if 
you  had  not  been  interrupted  as  you  were.  But 


DAN  RANDALL'S  ERROR  139 

the  big  end  of  the  whip  was  heavier  than  the  lash, 
and  the  arm  that  wielded  it  was  almost " 

Randall  made  one  quick  step  forward  toward 
his  tormentor.  Wadleigh  stopped  his  speech  with 
the  sentence  he  would  have  uttered  incomplete. 
Had  he  been  permitted  to  finish  it,  Randall  would 
have  known  that  it  was  Taggart  who  had  struck 
him  down— not  Joyce  Maitland.  Ace  Wad- 
leigh did  not  know,  then,  that  Joyce  had  returned 
to  the  office  after  her  departure  from  the  scene  of 
the  directors'  meeting. 

Wadleigh  seemed  to  shrink  backward,  away 
from  the  glare  in  Dan  Randall's  eyes,  although  he 
did  not  move  from  his  position.  It  was  his  spirit 
that  shrank.  Randall  was  dangerous  at  that  mo- 
ment, and  Wadleigh  knew  it. 

"If  you  so  much  as  utter  her  name,  I'll  kill  you 
now  with  my  hands,  Wadleigh,"  Dan  said;  and  he 
meant  every  word  of  it.  "She  was  there,  with  the 
quirt  in  her  grasp,  standing  over  me,  when  I 
opened  my  eyes.  You  had  gone  away.  I  never 
thought  you  were  a  coward  until  I  knew  that  you 
had  done  that." 

A  great  light  burst  upon  Ace  Wadleigh.  His 
lips  relaxed  almost  into  a  smile  as  he  compre- 
hended the  meaning  of  Randall's  words.  He 
caught  at  the  cue  readily. 

"I  supposed  that  she  would  follow  me,"  he  said, 
and  actually  smiled.  Unctious  glee  was  in  his 
heart  and  soul,  then. 

"She  saw  you  rob  me  of  the  old  deeds,"  Ran- 
dall went  on.  "She  saw  you  replace  them  with 
worthless  papers,  and  she  made  no  objection. 
You  were  foolhardy  to  dare  to  follow  me  here,  and 


140  UP  AGAINST  IT 

face  me,  if  you  knew  that  I  knew  that.  But  I 
don't  believe  that  you  did  know  it." 

"No.  I  did  not  know  that."  Wadleigh  actu- 
ally grinned  as  he  said  it. 

The  expression  was  maddening  to  Randall. 

He  covered  the  two  or  three  remaining  paces  be- 
tween him  and  his  tormentor  in  one  cat-like  spring. 
His  gloved  hands  were  thrust  forward  to  seize 
upon  Wadleigh,  when  the  latter,  whose  hands 
were  in  his  side  pockets,  shot  through  the  fur  coat 
he  was  wearing,  and  Randall  felt  the  sting  of  the 
bullet  as  it  grazed  the  flesh  of  his  thigh. 

For  the  second  time  that  day  Dan  Randall  lost 
his  temper. 


CHAPTER  XVI 
Dan  Randall's  Ultimatnm 

What  might  have  been  a  tragedy  ended  almost 
farcically. 

The  coat  worn  by  Wadleigh  had  been  handled 
somewhat  roughly  once  before,  that  same  day,  in 
Buxton's  store.  The  fastenings  upon  it  were  not 
secure.  They  broke  entirely  loose  in  Randall's 
grasp,  and  Wadleigh  was  literally  twisted  out  of 
the  garment  by  the  strength  of  Dan's  attack.  He 
reeled  backward,  straight  into  the  arms  of  Ser- 
geant Hurley,  who  had  discovered  the  two  men  to- 
gether, and  was  rushing  forward  to  prevent  the 
very  thing  that  had  happened. 

The  coat  remained  in  Randall's  grasp,  but  he 
flung  it  from  him  toward  the  ruins  of  the  burned 
building,  and  such  was  the  force  of  his  effort  that 
the  garment  was  sent  whirling  through  the  air,  al- 
most to  the  middle  of  the  heaped-up  debris;  to  the 
very  center  of  the  still  smoking  ruins. 

Dan  controlled  himself  with  an  effort. 

The  sight  of  Ace  Wadleigh,  coatless,  and  held 
tightly  in  the  arms  of  the  red-coated  representa- 
tive of  the  law,  helped  him  to  do  that.  Possibly 
a  humorous  twinkle  in  the  eyes  of  the  sergeant 
helped  a  little,  too. 

"Hurley,"  Dan  said,  "this  quarrel  was  not  of 


142  UP  AGAINST  IT 

my  seeking.  Wadleigh  followed  me  to  this  spot 
and  forced  it  upon  me.  If  you  arrest  one  of  us 
you  must  take  both.  And  if  you  do  not  take  either 
of  us,  let  me  advise  you  to  warn  that  man  to  keep 
away  from  me." 

"I'll  warn  you  both  to  keep  away  from  one  an- 
other," the  sergeant  replied.  "If  there  is  a  repe- 
tition of  this  scene,  or  anything  like  it,  I'll  send 
you  both  down  to  Regina  for  trial.  Leave  us,  Mr. 
Randall.  Mr.  Wadleigh,  you'd  better  recover 
your  coat  if  you  care  to  save  it.  Who  fired  that 
pistol?" 

"Nobody,"  Randall  replied  quickly.  "You 
thought  you  heard  one,  Sergeant.  Nobody  was 
hurt." 

"Oh.  Very  well.  Go  away,  Randall— and  be 
good." 

Randall  turned  away  toward  Buxton's  store. 
Wadleigh  hastened  to  recover  his  coat  of  fur. 
Sergeant  Hurley  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and 
went  on  about  his  business. 

From  inside  the  store  nothing  whatever  had 
been  observed  of  the  incident.  Buxton  and  the 
five  men  who  were  there  were  gathered  about  the 
stove,  and  Randall,  feeling  disinclined  to  joining 
in  with  their  conversation,  turned  about  when  he 
had  closed  the  door  after  him  and  looked  out 
through  the  window  in  the  upper  half  of  it. 

What  he  saw  arrested  his  attention  at  once. 

Wadleigh  had  gained  the  middle  of  the  ruin, 
had  recovered  his  coat  and  was  in  the  act  of 
thrusting  his  arms  into  the  sleeves,  when  some- 
thing that  he  saw  among  the  ashes  where  it  had 
fallen  seemed  to  catch  his  attention  and  hold  it. 


Randall  saw  him  bend  forward  with  an  eager 
gesture  when  the  coat  was  only  half  way  on,  saw 
him  retain  that  attitude  for  a  time,  then  glance 
hastily  around  him  with  quick  turns  of  his  head. 

Apparently  satisfied,  Wadleigh  wrapped  his 
frogless  coat  around  him  and  hurried  away  from 
the  ruin  without  so  much  as  a  backward  glance 
toward  it;  but  Dan,  from  the  window,  continued  to 
gaze  at  the  spot  he  had  left,  wondering  what  it 
could  be  that  Wadleigh  had  seen  that  had  so  in- 
terested him. 

"Buxton,  come  here  a  moment,"  he  called  out; 
and  when  Buxton  paused  beside  him  at  the  win- 
dow, he  added,  in  a  low  tone  which  the  others 
could  not  hear:  "I  just  had  another  little  run-in 
with  Ace.  Never  mind  about  the  particulars.  Do 
you  see  that  spot  over  there  among  the  ruins, 
pretty  close  to  the  middle,  where  the  smoke  is  a 
trifle  thicker  and  bluer  than  in  other  places?" 

"Yes.    What  about  it?"  Buxton  replied. 

"I  intended  to  throw  Wadleigh  about  to  that 
spot  when  I  grabbed  him  a  few  minutes  ago.  In- 
stead, I  threw  his  coat  there.  He  fell  out  of  it,  or 
got  out  of  it,  somehow.  When  I  came  away,  he 
went  after  it.  Bux,  he  found  something  there,  be- 
sides the  coat.  And  whatever  it  was  that  he  found, 
he  didn't  take  it  away  with  him.  Do  you  suppose 
it  is  possible  that  those  records  were  not  quite  all 
burned  up?" 

Buxton  shrugged  his  shoulders  without  reply- 
ing. He  stood  silently  beside  Randall  studying 
the  ruins  with  knitted  brows. 

"The  safe  wasn't  big  enough  to  hold  half  of  the 
record-books,"  he  remarked,  presently.  "Those 


144  UP  AGAINST  IT 

that  could  not  be  stowed  inside  of  it  were  arranged 
in  racks  along  the  wall,  at  either  side  of  it.  Re- 
member, Dan?" 

"Yes." 

"I  was  trying  to  remember  which  books  were 
kept  in  the  racks,  and  which  in  the  safe.  I  can't 
doit.  Can  you?" 

"No;  because  I  never  knew." 

1  'Well,  big  record  books  like  those  were  do  not 
bnrn  very  freety.  They  char;  and  the  corners  and 
edges  of  them  turn  to  cinders,  but— you  know." 

"Yes." 

"It  is  barely  possible "  He  did  not  com- 
plete the  sentence.  After  a  moment  he  spoke 
again. 

"You  stay  here  and  keep  store  a  little  while," 
he  said.  "I  am  going  down  the  street  to  see  the 
old  captain.  There  ought  to  be  a  guard  placed 
over  those  ruins." 

Buxton  seized  his  furs  and  hastened  outside  into 
the  biting  air  again.  Randall  watched  him  go, 
meditatively.  And  then,  just  within  his  range  of 
vision,  twenty  rods  or  more  distant,  Taggart  and 
Wadleigh  appeared  from  the  direction  of  the  bar- 
racks. 

Dan  saw  Buxton  meet  them,  and  pause,  facing 
them.  He  could  see,  although  not  distinctly,  ow- 
ing to  the  slanting  vision  that  he  had  through 
the  small  window  in  the  door,  that  they  ap- 
peared to  be  talking  rather  heatedly.  Then  all 
three  went  rapidly  toward  the  smouldering  ruin 
of  the  Record  Office  building. 

Dan,  who  still  wore  his  furs,  although  he  had 
loosened  them  when  he  entered  the  store,  tight- 


DAN  RANDALL'S  ULTIMATUM       145 

ened  them  around  him  again,  and  went  outside. 

He  stopped  on  the  steps,  and,  through  the  keen, 
frosty  air,  he  could  hear  the  voice  of  Burchard 
Buxton  quite  plainly.  He  was  saying: 

"I'm  not  saying  that  it  isn't  all  right,  Wad- 
leigh.  Perhaps  it  is.  But  if  you  and  Taggart  in- 
tend to  do  any  searching  among  those  ruins,  with- 
out due  authority,  I  am  going  to  stand  by,  and  see 
what  you  find,  and  what  you  carry  away." 

It  was  Taggart  who  wheeled  upon  Buxton  and 
stopped  him  in  the  middle  of  the  roadway. 

"It's  goin'  to  be  mighty  unhealthy  f'r  you, 
Burch  Buxton,  to  butt  into  this  here  business," 
he  said.  "If  you  know  what's  good  f'r  you^ 
you'll  keep  y'r  hands  off 'nit.  See?  We  ain't " 

He  stopped. 

Across  the  street,  Randall  was  slowly  approach- 
ing the  group.  Taggart  and  Wadleigh  discovered 
him  at  the  same  instant.  Buxton,  perceiving  that 
something  was  happening  behind  him,  turned 
about  also. 

Dan  approached  quietly,  and  leisurely,  and  no- 
body spoke  until  he  was  quite  near. 

"Go  ahead  with  your  errand,  Bux,"  Dan  said, 
quietly.  "I  will  see  to  it  that  nobody  does  any 
digging  in  those  ruins,  until  you  get  back.  Go  on, 
Bux.  There  won't  be  any  fuss  here,  unless  these 
two  thieves  start  one";  and  he  smiled  into  the 
faces  of  the  two  men. 

Taggart  took  one  quick  step  toward  him,  but 
Wadleigh  seized  the  ex-lumberjack's  arm  and 
pulled  him  back,  and  for  the  space  of  half  a  min- 
ute the  four  men  stared  at  each  other  in  utter  si- 
lence. 


146  UP  AGAINST  IT 

It  was  a  tense  interval,  too. 

What  the  outcome  of  it  might  have  been  if  there 
had  been  no  interruption  cannot  be  guessed  at. 
But  Buxton,  who  had  stepped  up  beside  Randall, 
and  was  facing  down  the  street  more  than  the  oth- 
ers, saw,  approaching  them,  the  very  red-coated 
officer  he  had  been  seeking. 

"Here  comes  Captain  Badmington,"  he  said, 
quickly.  And  knowing  that  there  would  be  no 
further  trouble  he  started  away  from  the  others  to 
meet  the  captain. 

"I'll  take  this  opportunity  to  say  something  to 
both  of  you,"  Randall  said,  in  a  low  tone,  the  mo- 
ment Buxton  had  gone.  "You'd  best  listen  to  me, 
too.  You  both  know  that  I  had  all  the  papers  nec- 
essary to  give  me  that  right  of  way  across  the  pass. 
You  both  know  that  Ace  Wadleigh  stole  them  from 
me,  and  when  and  how  he  did  it.  You  both  know 
that  the  official  records  of  them  were  burned  in 
the  fire  that  destroyed  this  building.  I  know, 
now,  that  Peter  Gaffney  had  forged  my  name  to 
documents  which  purported  to  transfer  that  right 
of  way  to  you.  I  know  that  Gaffney's  death  was 
a  deliberate  murder.  Some  day,  somehow,  I  shall 
find  a, way  to  prove  it.  We  all  know  that  I  tore 
the  stolen  papers  from  Wadleigh  (and  perhaps 
the  forged  ones,  also)  during  that  tussle  in  the 
store,  and  that  they  flew  into  the  stove  and  were 
burned.  Well,  so  far  as  all  that  is  concerned,  we 
stand  on  even  ground.  I've  got  the  right  on  my 
side,  because  I  am  the  real  owner  of  the  property. 
It  is  mine,  and  I'm  going  to  hold  onto  it.  Neither 
you,  nor  old  Lionel  Gregory,  nor  anybody  else, 
can  get  it  away  from  me— unless  I'm  dead  first. 


DAN  RANDALL'S  ULTIMATUM       147 

Ace,  you  know  something  about  what  you're  up 
against  when  you  tackle  me  in  this  manner.  Tag- 
gart  does  not  know;  he  only  guesses  at  it;  but  you 
can  tell  him  all  that  he  doesn't  know.  You'd  bet- 
ter warn  him.  You  can  have,  and  you  may  keep 
until  it  rots,  the  Manitoba  &  Juneau  railroad,  and 
everything  that  goes  with  it.  I  will  not  raise  a 
finger  to  get  it  back  until  I  want  it;  and  when  I  do 
want  it,  I'll  buy  it  of  you  for  a  song.  Now,  I'm 
not  going  to  threaten  you,  but  I  am  going  to  tell 
you  something.  If  you  two,  and  your  followers, 
male  or  female,  get  in  my  way,  I'll  break  your 
hearts  first,  your  pocketbooks  next,  and  your 
necks  afterward.  And  that  will  be  about  all  for 
the  present.  If  there  is  any  digging  done  among 
those  ruins,  now,  it  will  be  done  under  the  observa- 
tion, and  by  the  permission,  of  the  Northwest 
Mounted  Police." 

Dan  Randall  turned  abruptly  and  re-entered  the 
store. 


CHAPTER  XVII 
A  Touch  of  the  Tempest 

Joyce  Maitland  never  doubted  that  she  would 
be  able  to  intercept  Dan  Randall  at  the  entrance 
to  Magician  pass. 

If  her  judgment  was  at  fault  in  that  respect,  it 
was  because  she  figured  his  possible  speed  over  the 
crust,  on  snowshoes,  by  what  she  might  have  done 
herself  under  like  circumstances,  and  she  did  not 
take  into  proper  consideration  his  greater  strength 
and  powers  of  endurance;  also,  she  had  heard  and 
seen  enough  at  the  home  of  Yvonne  to  convince 
her  that  there  was  a  rendezvous  arranged  some- 
where, between  Dan  and  Jules,  and  that  Dan 
would  be  delayed  because  of  it;  and,  lastly,  be- 
cause of  the  speed  she  made  in  running  the  loco- 
motive from  Janver  to  Bluerock,  thus  so  greatly 
shortening  the  distance  she  had  to  travel,  as  com- 
pared with  what  she  knew  Dan  would  be  obliged 
to  cover,  she  harbored  no  doubt  of  her  ability  to 
intercept  him. 

That  she  did  not  succeed  we  already  know. 
I  As  a  matter  of  fact,  although  she  was  not  aware 
of  it,  she  arrived  at  the  entrance  to  the  defile  very 
shortly  after  Dan  and  Jules  had  passed  that  way 
with  the  dogs  and  the  strong  but  light  sled  with  its 
burden  of  shovels,  blankets,  and  other  necessaries 


A  TOUCH  OF  THE  TEMPEST          149 

for  sustaining  life,  in  the  event  of  an  emergency. 

When  the  first  frenzy  of  that  terrific  storm 
swept  down  from  the  mountains— that  first  out- 
pouring of  the  full  savagery  of  the  elements  which 
drove  Dan  and  his  companion  into  the  niche  for 
shelter— Joyce  was  less  than  an  eighth  of  a  mile 
behind  them.  Had  she  but  known  it,  or  had  they, 
how  differently  might  all  things  concerning  this 
history  have  been  told. 

Had  Joyce  travelled  so  much  as  ten  rods  farther 
than  she  did,  before  the  storm  burst  upon  her,  she 
must  have  come  upon  their  tracks  where  they 
bowed  in  from  the  direction  of  White  Lake;  but 
which  became  entirely  obliterated  within  a  mo- 
ment after  that  first  blast  of  wind  and  snow. 

It  waa  better  that  she  did  not  find  the  trail,  for 
had  she  done  so,  she  must  have  struggled  onward 
in  the  hope  of  overtaking  them;  and  so  she  would 
have  perished. 

As  it  was,  that  wild  tempest  befriended  Joyce 
Maitland.  WTiile  seeming  to  threaten  her,  it  spared 
her.  Although  utterly  terrifying  in  its  sudden  on- 
slaught, it  really  was  her  savior. 

The  fury  of  it  was  appalling.  In  the  grasp  of  it 
she  was  as  helpless  as  a  chip  of  wood  in  midstream, 
sweeping  onward  toward  the  rapids.  She  had  no 
strength  to  contend  against  it,  or  even  to  with- 
stand it;  and  not  being  weather-wise,  it  is  not 
strange  that  it  found  her  entirely  unprepared. 
Even  Jules  Legarde  had  not  anticipated  the  force 
and  fury  of  it,  as  we  know. 

Joyce  was  swept  off  her  feet  in  a  twinkling. 

The  mysterious,  but  awful  power  of  the  wind 
seized  upon  her  as  if  with  giant  hands,  and  yet,  as 


150  UP  AGAINST  IT 

it  proved,  with  gentle  touch,  and  rolled  her  over 
and  over  before  it,  through  the  blinding  snow,  and 
the  intense  darkness  that  had  fallen  with  it. 

The  storm  came  from  the  direction  of  the  Badger 
range,  across  the  valley  where  stood  the  thriving 
town  of  Janver.  It  lifted  itself  over  the  top  of  the 
Ridge  where  Joyce  had  discovered  Dan  from  the 
window  of  her  room,  putting  on  his  snowshoes.  It 
dipped  from  there  across  the  Little  Lantowa  river 
bottom,  and  whirled  into  the  mouth  of  Magician 
pass,  much  as  a  volume  of  water  will  pour  into  a 
funnel  which  has  been  made  ready  to  receive 
it. 

Thus,  Joyce  was  borne  up  the  defile,  instead  of 
being  swept  out  of  it.  Thus,  had  there  been  no 
obstruction  in  the  way,  she  might  have  been  car- 
ried to  the  very  spot  where  Dan  and  Jules  had 
sought  temporary  shelter. 

But  the  god  of  the  winds,  with  fingers  that  fash- 
ioned things  mightily,  and  well,  rolled  her  over 
the  snow  like  a  stray  straw,  until,  with  an  eccen- 
tric twist  of  the  tempest,  she  was  lifted  around  the 
protecting  end  of  a  huge  boulder,  and  tucked  away 
beneath  the  overhanging  lee  side  of  it,  as  snugly, 
and  as  entirely  out  of  the  wind,  as  if  she  had  been 
thrown  into  a  cavern  under  the  mountain. 

Joyce  was  breathless.  She  was  frightened;  and, 
because  she  was  frightened,  half  stunned,  and  only 
semi-conscious  for  a  time. 

For  a  space  that  cannot  be  reckoned  by  minutes 
or  seconds  because  they  might  have  been  few  or 
many,  she  made  no  attempt  to  move.  She  laid 
perfectly  still  where  the  giant  hands  of  the  wind 
had  put  her;  and  those  same  unseen  hands,  as  if  to 


A  TOUCH  OF  THE  TEfVIPEST          151 

take  advantage  of  the  opportunity,  packed  parti- 
cle after  particle  of  the  driving  snow  round  about 
her  resting  place,  until  she  was  walled  in  as  safely 
and  securely,  and  as  cozily,  as  it  is  possible  to 
imagine. 

By  the  time  that  Joyce  had  recovered  her  think- 
ing powers  sufficiently  to  have  acted,  and  to  have 
made  use  of  her  muscles,  she  also  became  wise 
enough  to  know  that  it  was  infinitely  better  that 
she  should  remain  quite  still,  just  where  she  was, 
sheltered  from  the  fury  of  the  storm,  and  with  the 
protecting  blanket  of  wind-packed  snow  tucked 
snug  and  warm  around  her. 

She  could  hear,  faintly,  through  the  friendly 
barrier  that  shielded  her,  the  roar  of  the  storm  as 
it  swept  on  up  the  canyon.  She  knew  that  out 
there  the  cold  was  intense,  that  certain  death 
stalked  boldly  abroad,  or  lurked  in  waiting  for  the 
unwary— and  she  knew  also  that  she  was  tempo- 
rarily safe  within  the  shelter  into  which  the  wind 
had  tossed  her,  and  that  the  heat  of  her  own  body 
within  the  tempest-made  thermo  envelope  of  snow 
eliminated  all  danger  of  freezing  for  the  time  be- 
ing. Later,  there  would  be  the  task  of  escaping 
from  the  perils  that  threatened,  of  which  the  pres- 
ent and  clamorous  pangs  of  hunger  were  not  the 
least  to  be  considered. 

Joyce  Maitland  was  strong  and  able.  In  the 
East  she  would  have  been  called  a  girl-athlete. 
She  was  the  personification  of  health  and  energy. 
She  was  accustomed,  and  therefore  inured,  to  the 
cold.  She  was  thoroughly  and  warmly  clad  from 
the  top  of  her  prettily  fur-hooded  head  to  her  fur- 
clothed  legs  and  feet,  and  her  young  and  splendid 


152  UP  AGAINST  IT 

body,  glowing  with  youth,  and  hope,  and  strength, 
and  promise,  gave  off  heat  enough  of  its  own,  in- 
side the  furs  and  snow,  to  protect  her,  so  long  as 
she  could  remain  within  that  secure  retreat. 

She  was  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  character 
of  those  sudden  mountain  storms  that  are  like  sum- 
mer squalls  of  rain  and  wind  in  their  spasmodic 
fury,  but  which  rarely  last  for  long.  She  knew 
that  this  was  one  of  them,  and  that  it  would  prob- 
ably pass  away  with  the  coming  of  another  day. 

There  was  snow  within  reach  of  her  hand  if  she 
became  thirsty,  and  she  would  not  seriously  re- 
quire food  for  many  hours  to  come. 

Thus,  lying  there  under  the  shelter  of  the  rock, 
she  reasoned  it  all  out,  conscious  of  the  fact  that 
she  was  quite  sufficiently  warm  and  would  keep 
so;  and  she  knew,  too,  that  somewhere  within  her 
bower  of  snow  there  was  a  slight  opening  through 
which  the  air  was  filtering  to  her,  so  that  she  was 
in  no  danger  of  suifocation. 

Oddly  enough,  one  of  her  greatest  comforts 
throughout  her  extremity  was  the  belief  that  the 
violence  of  the  storm  would  have  driven  Dan  Ran- 
dall and  his  companion  to  seek  shelter,  and  that 
they  could  not  be  very  far  away  from  her  own  se- 
cure haven. 

Then,  drowsiness  stole  over  her,  and  realizing 
that  it  was  not  of  the  dangerous  kind  that  precedes 
freezing,  she  gave  way  to  it,  and  slept. 

The  wild  storm  of  that  tempestuous  night  af- 
fected still  another  one  of  the  persons  who  (all  un- 
thinkingly to  herself)  was  to  play  a  great  part  in 
the  successful  outcome  of  the  Janver  Cut-off. 

Yvonne. 


A  TOUCH  OF  THE  TEMPEST          153 

She  was  a  child  of  the  snows.  She  had  been 
bora  in  midwinter,  on  the  shore  of  Lake  La  Martre, 
which  is  midway  between  the  Great  Slave  and  the 
Great  Bear  lakes,  where  the  cold  was  intense,  and 
where  there  was  probably  not  another  human  be- 
ing than  her  own  father  and  mother  within  hun- 
dreds of  miles  when  she  came  into  'the  world;  and 
winter  after  winter,  afterward,  until  she  was  al- 
most a  young  woman,  Yvonne  had  gone  northward 
with  her  parents  in  the  provision-laden  canoe,  to 
return  with  them  in  the  spring  time  when  they 
brought  the  annual  crop  of  furs  to  the  post. 

When  Joyce  left  her,  and  sped  toward  the  rail- 
way station  and  the  roundhouse,  bent  upon  the 
suddenly  conceived  errand,  Yvonne  merely 
shrugged  her  pretty  shoulders  and  tilted  her  chin 
a  trifle,  and  went  about  the  rest  of  her  preparations 
for  the  move  she  intended  to  make  that  very  day. 

Already  she  had  spoken  to  her  friend,  Pitou 
Rondil,  who  would  help  her  to  get  the  things  she 
had  decided  to  take  with  her  across  the  ridge  and 
the  valley  beyond  it,  to  the  stone  house  at  White 
Lake.  Already  she  had  got  the  articles  from  the 
room  of  m'sieu,  at  the  house  of  the  judge,  and  had 
taken  them  to  Pitou.  Very  soon  Pitou  would  be 
at  the  door  with  his  homemade  sledge  and  his 
tough  and  wiry  little  horse.  For  the  crust  was 
hard  and  firm  along  the  way  that  they  would  go. 

But,  when  Yvonne  had  packed  the  few  articles 
which  she  intended  to  take  with  her  from  Ace 
Wadleigh's  house— the  few  things  that  were  liter- 
ally her  own,  and  Jules'— and  had  stepped  outside 
the  door  to  look  for  the  approach  of  Pitou,  shei 
stood  facing  the  great  Badger  range  to  the  west  of 


154  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Janver;  and  she  saw  what  Jules,  and  Dan,  and 
Joyce  had  failed  to  see;  the  sullenly  angry  and 
threatening  bank  of  inky  clouds  that  was  rushing 
down  upon  them  from  the  northwest. 

Yvonne's  first  thought  was  one  of  regret,  for  ex- 
perience told  her  that  the  projected  removal  of  her 
things  that  day  was  impossible  now.  But,  with  a 
shrug  of  her  shoulders  and  a  shake  of  her  pretty 
head  she  dismissed  it,  and  returned  inside. 

Her  second  thought  was  one  of  concern.  She 
wondered  at  what  part  of  the  pass  the  m'sieu  and 
Jules  would  be  when  the  coming  storm  should 
strike;  and  she  shrugged  again,  with  infinite  faith 
in  those  two,  no  matter  what  the  storm  might 
threaten. 

But  she  went  to  the  door  again,  after  a  time,  to 
look  at  the  clouds,  and  she  saw  how  they  had 
spread  themselves  out  over  the  valley;  she  felt  the 
ominous  pressure  of  their  nearer  approach. 

Pitou  arrived  with  the  first  blast  of  the  tempest. 

With  him,  also,  it  was  a  foregone  conclusion  that 
there  would  be  no  journey  to  White  Lake  that  eve- 
ning. He  decided  that  he  would  not  even  attempt 
to  return  to  his  own  cabin,  at  the  opposite  side  of 
the  town,  while  the  storm  raged,  and  so  he  housed 
his  sturdy  little  horse  and  sled  in  the  lean-to  be- 
hind the  house,  and  went  inside. 

"Ver'  bad,  dat  wind,"  he  said,  apologetically, 
much  as  if  it  were  his  own  fault. 

Yvonne  nodded.  She  was  disappointed,  but  she 
was  practical.  She  understood  how  impossible  it 
was  that  they  should  proceed  with  their  plans. 

"Eet  ees  ver'  much  mauvais  temps,  petite,"  he 
added,  presently.  "Ver'  bad  for  la  ma'm'selle, 


A  TOUCH  OF  THE  TEMPEST          155 

no?"  Pitou  was  bending  near  the  fire,  nibbing 
his  hands  together. 

Yvonne,  who  had  crossed  the  room  to  one  of  the 
windows,  turned  about,  suddenly. 

' '  What  is  that?  What  did  you  say,  Pitou?"  she 
demanded  rapidly,  in  French. 

"Ma'm'selle,  Joie;  she  take  la  voiture  a  vapeur 
from  ze  roundhouse,  and  run  away  avec  il.  Oui; 
vraiment.  Just  now.  One  leetle  while  ago.  Eet 
ees  ver'  colt  outside,  petite.  She  freeze-up, 
mabby.  Je  suis  tres  triste.  Non?  And  thou,  also, 
petite?  You  sorry,  too,  mabby?" 

''But,  I  do  not  understand,"  said  Yvonne,  still 
speaking  in  French,  refusing  to  mix  her  words. 
"What  did  mademoiselle  Joie  do?  Tell  me  the 
truth." 

"Je  ne  sais  quoi,  for  true.  She  tak  ze  engine. 
She  run  away  avec  it.  Not  go  ver'  far.  No.  Eet 
ees  not  possible.  Bluerock,  mabby.  Mais,  for 
why?"  Pitou  shrugged  his  wide  shoulders  in  a 
gesture  of  dismissal. 

"Listen  to  me  a  moment,"  Yvonne  exclaimed, 
under  her  breath,  still  speaking  in  good  French, 
for  she  wished  Pitou  thoroughly  to  understand  all 
that  she  said.  "Is  it  true  that  mademoiselle 
Maitland  took  the  locomotive  from  Tihe  house 
where  they  keep  them,  and  ran  away  with 
it,  toward  the  mountain?  And  that  she  went 
alone?" 

"Oui,  petite;  eet  ees  true,"  Pitou  replied. 
"They  go  after  her,  maintenant.  They  get  up 
steam  een  another  one.  But,  dat  tak'  mooch  time; 
non?  Tom  Rodman,  heem  gone  half  casse,  al- 
ready," and  Pitou  touched  his  forehead  signifi- 


156  UP  AGAINST  IT 

cantly  to  indicate  Rodman's  condition  of  half- 
crazed  anxiety. 

Yvonne  clasped  her  hands  together  before  her, 
and  stood  so  for  a  moment,  in  deep  thought. 

It  was  all  clear  to  her  upon  the  instant  why 
Joyce  had  stolen  the  engine,  and  why  she  had  gone 
with  it  down  the  track  toward  Bluerock  and  the 
pass  over  the  mountain,  to  Magician. 

It  was  because  m'sieu  had  gone  that  way. 

Yvonne  would  have  done  the  same  thing  herself, 
under  like  circumstances.  She  understood.  She 
comprehended.  Her  intuition  had  already  told 
her  that  there  had  been  a  quarrel  of  some  sort  be- 
tween Joyce  and  Dan.  "Perhaps,  after  all,  ma'm'- 
selle  Joie  loves  him,"  she  was  thinking,  while  she 
recalled,  not  without  regret,  that  she  had  been  an- 
gry with  madamoiselle  that  day,  and  had  treated 
her  badly.  Yvonne  was  sorry  for  it,  then. 

It  was  strange  how  suddenly  Joyce  Maitland 
rose  again  to  favor  in  the  heart  and  mind  of  the 
little  French  woman  with  this  information  that 
old  Pitou  had  brought  to  her  out  of  the  storm;  nor 
was  she  one  whit  unmindful  of  the  peril  that  Joyce 
must  be  encountering  at  that  very  moment,  and  of 
the  new  dangers  she  would  have  to  encounter  with 
every  added  instant  of  time. 

The  heart  of  Yvonne  throbbed  madly,  then. 
Ma'm'selle  had  done  exactly  what  she,  herself, 
might  have  attempted  under  like  circumstances. 
Suddenly  she  understood— and  activity  returned 
to  her.  She  sprang  toward  old  Pitou,  seized  his 
arms,  thoroughly  startling  the  old  man  by  her  ve- 
hemence. 

"She  must  be  saved!"  she  cried  out.    "Ah,  the 


A  TOUCH  OF  THE  TEMPEST          157 

m'sieu  would  die,  if  la  Joie  should  freeze  to  death 
out  there.  He  would  nevair  forgive  Yvonne. 
Non.  Nevair.  She  must  be  saved,  Pitou.  You 
hear  me?  She  must  be  saved.  I,  Yvonne  must 
save  her,  and  you,  Pitou,  must  help  me." 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

The  Tracks  in  the  Snow 

With  trembling  haste  Yvonne  began  to  don  the 
outer  clothing  which  she  knew  that  she  would  need 
to  face  the  storm  that  was  now  raging  outside. 
Her  pretty  face  was  drawn  into  hard  lines  of  de- 
termination, her  eyes  were  wide  and  serious,  and 
her  whole  demeanor  was  that  of  one  who  is  about 
to  assume  a  task  that  is  already  hopeless,  but 
which,  nevertheless,  shall  be  performed. 

Old  Pitou  watched  her  out  of  his  small,  beady 
eyes.  Twice,  while  she  was  thus  employed,  he 
shook  his  grizzled  head,  slowly.  At  last,  when 
she  was  nearly  ready,  he  put  himself  between  her 
and  the  door,  and  stood  there  with  folded  arms 
until  she  looked  toward  him  and  discovered  his 
attitude. 

She  understood  it,  too.  She  knew,  herself,  that 
she  should  not  venture  into  the  storm,  and  she  saw 
instantly  that  Pitou  intended  to  prevent  her  from 
doing  so;  by  force,  if  necessary. 

"I  must  go,"  she  told  him,  as  if  he  had  already 
put  his  objection  into  words;  but  he  shook  his 
head. 

"Non,  non,  Yvonne,"  he  said,  in  reply.  "Eet 
ees  la  mort.  La  tempete  ees  ver'  bad.  You  freeze, 
too,  mabby.  For  why  you  go,  petite?  You  theenk 


THE  TRACKS  IN  THE  SNOW    159 

you  sav'  La  Joie?  But,  non.  Eet  ees  not  pos- 
sible. You  will  stay  here,  avec  moi,  petite." 

There  was  such  quiet  determination  in  the  at- 
titude of  the  old  man  that  Yvonne  knew  that  he 
would  not  permit  her  to  pass.  Moreover,  she 
knew  that  he  was  right  in  refusing  to  do  so. 
Nevertheless,  she  sought  to  argue  with  him.  Pitou 
only  shook  his  old  head  the  more  firmly  when  she 
had  finished  with  a  torrent  of  words  in  which  she 
sought  to  convince  him  that  it  was  her  duty  to 
make  the  attempt  to  save  Joyce  Maitland,  and  that 
m'sieu  would  never  forgive  her  if  she  sat  quietly 
inactive  while  the  girl  he  loved  was  freezing  to 
death  out  there,  in  the  storm. 

Pitou  kept  his  place  between  Yvonne  and  the 
door. 

"For  why  you  go?"  he  demanded  again. 
"Parceque  you  theenk  to  save  her  from  the  tem- 
pete,  and  the  cold.  Eet  ees  too  late  for  dat.  Eef 
she  freeze,  she  already  freeze— now.  Non?  For 
true  eet  ees  so.  Bimeby,  mabby,  when  the  wind 
have  stopped,  you  can  go.  Je  alle  avec  toi,  then. 
I  go,  too.  Mais,  maintenant?  Sacrrrrre!  Deja, 
eef  la  ma'm'selle  freeze,  she  ees  dead  by  now.  But, 
mabby  she  fin'  somme  place  cacher;  somme  leetle 
place  to  hide  herself  unteel  the  tempete  ees  gone." 

Yvonne  did  not  reply  to  him.  She  remained  as 
she  was,  facing  Pitou,  as  yet  undecided  whether  to 
attempt  to  force  her  way  past  him,  or  not.  He 
went  on  again  with  his  arguments. 

"Eef  petite  will  theenk  about  eet,  un  leetle  mo- 
ment, just  for  the  sak'  of  old  Pitou.  La  ma'm'- 
selle, she  tak'  la  voiture  a  vapeur,  ze  engine,  an' 
run  away  with  eet.  Already,  maintenant,  long 


160  UP  AGAINST  IT 

while  ago,  she  get  to  Bluerock,  mabby,  an'  start 
for  the  pass.  Tres  bien.  Mabby  she  fin'  the 
m'sieu  et  Jules;  mabby  they  fin'  her.  But,  thou? 
Een  thees  storm,  you  fin'  theem?  Non!" 

Yvonne  began  slowly  to  lay  aside  her  wraps. 

She  had  been  convinced  even  before  she  made 
the  attempt  to  start  out  into  the  storm  that  it 
would  be  useless,  and  she  knew  how  utterly  im- 
possible it  would  be  for  her  to  find  any  trace  of 
Joyce,  even  if  she  were  there,  at  the  entrance  to 
the  pass.  Every  track  that  the  girl  might  have 
made  would  now  be  obliterafed— and,  if  Joyce  had 
succeeded  in  finding  some  sort  of  shelter  from  the 
fury  of  the  wind,  as  Pitou  suggested,  and  had 
enough  judgment  to  pack  the  snow  around  her,  she 
need  not  freeze,  clad  as  Yvonne  knew  her  to  be,  and 
with  the  health  and  endurance  that  Yvonne  knew 
her  to  possess. 

So  she  seated  herself  in  a  chair  near  the  window 
and  listened  to  the  roar  of  the  gale  as  it  shrieked 
past  the  house;  and  Pitou,  perceiving  that  Yvonne 
had  abandoned  all  thought  of  going,  for  the  time 
being,  filled  his  short  pipe,  lighted  it,  drew  a  chair 
close  to  the  fire,  and  smoked  and  drowsed,  and 
presently  dreamed  about  other  tempests  of  like 
character  through  which  he  had  passed  when  there 
had  been  next  to  no  shelter  at  hand  to  protect  him. 

After  a  time,  Yvonne  left  him  there,  asleep  near 
the  fire,  and  went  to  her  own  room,  where  she 
tossed  and  turned  in  uneasy  sleep  until  a  sudden 
cessation  of  the  tempest's  violence  roused  her. 

The  storm  ended  as  it  had  begun.  It  had  blown 
out  its  fury,  and  dawn  was  at  hand. 

Yvonne  peered  into  the  kitchen  and  discovered 


THE  TRACKS  IN  THE  SNOW    161 

that  Pitou  had  disappeared.  She  did  not  doubt 
that  he  had  been  gone  a  long  time,  and  she  knew 
that  he  would  return,  presently,  with  such  news 
as  might  be  obtained  at  the  railway  station. 

While  she  was  preparing  breakfast  she  went 
frequently  to  the  door  and  looked  for  him,  for  she 
was  impatient  now  to  be  gone.  At  least  she  could 
search  for  ma'm'selle  Joie,  whom  m'sieu  loved, 
and  she  prayed  silently,  but  with  all  her  heart 
and  soul  in  her  prayers,  that  Joyce  might  have 
been  spared. 

The  news  that  Pitou  brought  to  her,  presently, 
was  meager  indeed. 

Tom  Rodman  had  made  the  run  to  Bluerock  and 
return.  The  engine  that  Joyce  had  taken  without 
permission  was  there.  That  was  all.  It  had  been 
impossible  for  them  to  continue  the  search.  They 
had  barely  been  able  to  get  back  to  Janver.  But 
they  were  now  getting  out  the  plows.  They  would 
fight  their  way  to  Bluerock;  and  after  that— after 
that  they  would  do  the  very  best  that  could  be 
done. 

Yvonne's  was  a  prophetic  soul. 

While  she  put  the  steaming  coffee  and  the  hot 
breakfast  before  Pitou  her  heart  became  suddenly 
light,  as  if  she  could  even  then  peer  intuitively 
into  that  safe  space  under  the  rock  which  the  snow 
and  wind  had  transformed  into  a  secure  cachette 
for  Joyce  Maitland. 

Her  abounding  faith  in  m'sieu,  which  was  in  all 
things  infinite,  gave  her  faith,  also,  in  the  things 
that  were  his,  and  in  the  hopes  and  wishes  that  he 
held  dear.  Her  own  adoration  for  Dan  had  made 
her  quick  to  know  of  the  boundless  love  he  felt  for 


162  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Joyce,  and  she  did  not  believe  for  a  moment  that 
le  bon  Dieu  would  permit  the  beautiful  American 
girl  to  perish  in  the  storm  that  had  raged  through- 
out the  night,  but  which  was  now  past  and  gone, 
as  if  it  had  never  been. 

But  the  storm  had  rendered  it  impossible  for 
Pitou 's  little  horse  to  draw  the  laden  sledge  to 
White  Lake  that  day.  Both  knew  that  there  would 
be  places  beyond  the  backbone  of  the  Ridge  where 
the  drifts  would  be  deep  indeed,  and  soft,  and  im- 
passable for  all  of  the  heavier  creatures  save  man 
himself,  supported  by  snowshoes. 

However,  Yvonne  took  the  time,  before  start- 
ing, to  pack  the  things  upon  the  sled,  that  it  might 
be  in  readiness  against  her  return. 

Then,  within  an  hour  after  daylight,  they  set 
out. 

Pitou  accompanied  Yvonne  wholly  as  a  matter 
of  duty  and  affection.  The  purpose  of  their  er- 
rand he  considered  entirely  hopeless.  Personally, 
he  would  have  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and  waited, 
until  the  thaws  came,  before  searching  for  the 
frozen  body  of  Joyce  Maitland.  Then  they  would 
be  able  to  find  it  quickly;  now  it  seemed  to  him  like 
a  useless  as  well  as  a  hopeless  task. 

Even  he,  experienced  as  he  was,  had  not  real- 
ized the  full  violence  of  the  storm,  and  had  not  cor- 
rectly estimated  the  difficulties  they  would  en- 
counter in  making  the  short  cut  across  the  ridge 
to  White  Lake. 

Pitou  did  not  consider  it  far.  An  hour,  two  hours, 
perhaps,  he  thought  entirely  sufficient  for  the  trip. 
Yvonne  agreed  with  him  in  that.  Nevertheless,  at 
the  end  of  two  hours  they  had  not  accomplished 


THE  TRACKS  IN  THE  SNOW    163 

half  the  distance,  and  it  was  very  nearly  five  hours 
after  they  came  away  from  the  house  in  Janver  be- 
fore they  arrived  at  the  entrance  to  Magician  pass. 

There  Pitou  came  to  a  stubborn  halt. 

"Que  voulez  vous,  Yvonne?"  he  exclaimed, 
querulously,  and  the  old  man  was  rarely  that,  par- 
ticularly with  the  wife  of  Jules.  "Eet  ees  almos' 
nuit.  Ma'm'selle  is  freeze  a  la  mort,  vraisem- 
blablement;  pourquoi  non?  Maintenant  it  will  be 
dark  before  we  can  get  to  the  stone  maison,  at  lac 
.la  Blanc.  Venez.  We  go  back." 

Yvonne  did  not  even  pause  to  reply.  She  hur- 
ried onward,  and  Pitou,  perforce,  followed  after 
her,  mumbling  as  he  went,  until,  presently,  he 
heard  her  cry  out  with  an  expression  of  mingled 
surprise  and  joy. 

The  old  man  hastened  to  her  side.  .She  was 
pointing  downward  at  the  snow,  but  the  quick 
eyes  of  Pitou  had  already  discovered  tracks  there; 
tracks  that  had  been  made  since  the  storm  of  last 
night;  tracks  which  might  have  been  made  only 
a  very  little  while  before  Yvonne  discovered 
them. 

Pitou  bent  down  over  the  trail  that  had  been 
left.  To  his  practical  sight  there  was  as  much 
individuality  about  the  track  left  by  a  snowshoe 
as  that  of  the  trotting  fox  or  the  triangular  im- 
print of  a  hare. 

This  one  he  recognized  the  instant  he  examined 
it.  More  than  once  he  had  traveled  through  the 
snows  beside  those  same  snowshoes.  Old  Pitou 
and  Tom  Rodman,  the  engineer,  were  great 
friends. 

"Eet  ees  m'sieu  Rodman  who  have  gone  by 


164  UP  AGAINST  IT 

here,  petite,"  he  said,  straightening  himself  again. 
"I  know  de  track  of  the  soulier  gauche.  I  mended 
dat  shoe,  moi-meme." 

""And  did  he  come  down  out  of  the  sky,  then,  to 
make  the  trail  here,  where  it  is?"  Yvonne  de- 
manded, in  French,  and  with  fine  scorn  of  Pitou's 
woodcraft  in  her  voice  and  attitude.  "See.  The 
trail  does  not  start  at  the  entrance  to  the  pass. 
But,  there.  Do  you  see?  Beneath  the  rock." 

She  fairly  flew  across  the  space  between  her  and 
the  boulder  beneath  which  Joyce  had  found  shel- 
ter. A  mere  glance  into  the  recess  out  of  which 
Joyce  had  dug  her  way  finally  convinced  both  of 
them  who  it  was  that  had  rested  there. 

The  trail  of  Tom  Rodman's  snowshoes,  which 
Joyce  had  taken  from  the  cab  of  the  engine,  led 
directly  up  the  pass  toward  the  summit. 

With  a  little  exclamation  of  delight  at  the  dis- 
covery they  had  made,  Yvonne  turned,  and  would 
have  followed  it,  had  not  the  strong  arms  of  Pitou 
seized  upon  and  held  her  tightly. 

"Non,  non,  petite,"  he  said,  with  finality  in  his 
tone.  "Eet  ees  night.  Soon  eet  weel  be  ver* 
dark.  Alors,  you  can't  see  the  trail  to  follow  eet. 
Eet  ees  ver'  colt  oop  dere,  even  now.  Bimeby 
eet  be  more  colt.  An'  la  ma'm'selle,  she  start 
long  ago,  mabby.  Bientot,  she  get  to  Devil's 
Pulpit.  She  rest,  there.  She  mak'  fire,  mabby. 
There  is  food  there,  aussi.  She  cook  eet.  We 
cannot  go  on,  now.  II  n'y  faut  plus  penser,  pe- 
tite." 

The  great  burden  of  it  all  was  that  Yvonne  knew 
that  Pitou  spoke  only  the  literal  truth.  Very  soon 
it  would  be  black  darkness  in  the  canyon  of  the 


THE  TRACKS  IN  THE  SNOW    165 

pass;  much  too  dark  for  any  hope  that  a  trail  could 
be  followed,  although  it  was  true  that  the  tracks 
could  lead  only  in  one  direction. 

Yet,  Yvonne's  loyalty  to  her  beloved  m'sieu  re- 
sented bitterly  the  thought  of  turning  back 
now. 

The  trail  had  been  found.  It  had  been  made  by 
Miss  Maitland.  Somewhere,  up  there  in  the  pass 
ahead  of  them,  Joyce  should  be  found.  Suppose 
something  had  happened  to  ma'm'selle,  and  she 
could  not  make  Devil's  Pulpit  in  time? 

With  sudden  decision  Yvonne  wrenched  herself 
free  from  the  clinging  grasp  of  old  Pitou  and 
darted  away  from  him,  up  the  pass;  but  in  her 
haste  she  tripped  one  of  her  snowshoes  beneath  the 
toe  of  the  other  one,  and  fell;  and  the  old  man, 
smiling  in  grim  humor,  seized  upon  her,  lifted  her 
in  his  arms,  and  bore  her  away  in  the  direction  of 
White  Lake,  despite  her  struggles. 

Nor  did  he  put  her  down  again  until  they  were 
a  long  distance  beyond  the  entrance  to  the  pass, 
and  darkness  had  really  fallen  upon  them.  He 
knew,  then,  that  she  could  not  return  alone,  and  he 
set  her  gently  down  upon  her  feet  beside  him. 

But  Yvonne  was  angry,  and  would  not  respond 
to  his  apologies,  and  so,  presently,  he  started  on, 
and  she  followed,  and  after  a  time  they  came 
safely  to  the  door  of  the  stone  cottage  where  Dan, 
Randall  had  determined  to  make  his  home. 

Both  halted  abruptly,  then,  and  both  were 
amazed  by  what  they  saw. 

From  a  side  window  which  had  been  invisible 
as  they  approached  the  house  a  light  streamed  out 
upon  the  snow;  and  it  shone  upon  tracks  that 


166  UP  AGAINST  IT 

passed  beneath  that  window,  showing  that  some- 
body had  lately  passed  that  way. 

Pitou  grasped  Yvonne's  arm,  as  a  signal  for  si- 
lence. With  cat-like  tread  he  passed  on  to  the 
tracks  under  the  window,  and  examined  them. 
Then  he  straightened  up  with  a  glad  cry,  and 
called  out  lustily: 

"Jules!    Jules!" 

The  doorway  was  flung  open  on  the  instant. 
Jules  stood  beyond  the  threshold.  A  warm  fire 
glowed  within  the  house.  Amazed  pleasure  was 
in  Jules'  eyes  when  he  saw  who  it  was  that  had  de- 
manded admittance. 

Yvonne  rushed  forward,  not  into  his  arms,  as  he 
had  expected,  but  past  him,  into  the  room,  search- 
ing eagerly  around  it,  everywhere,  for  another  per- 
son. Then  she  turned  to  face  her  husband. 

"Where  is  ma'm'selle  Joie?"  she  demanded. 
"She  is  here?  N'estcepas?" 

"Ici?  Ifon.  Pourquoi?"  Jules  replied,  spread- 
ing out  his  hands  and  hunching  his  broad  shoul- 
ders. "La  ma'm'selle  ees  een  Janvers;  non?  For 
why  you  ask  me  dat,  Yvonne?" 

Yvonne  explained.  She  told  of  everything  that 
had  happened  since  Jules'  departure,  omitting 
nothing,  and  ended  with  a  description  of  the  trail 
that  had  led  up  the  canyon,  which  Pitou  would  not 
permit  her  to  follow. 

At  the  end  of  it,  Jules  shrugged  his  shoulders 
again,  outwardly  undisturbed  by  all  that  he  had 
heard.  But  he  reached  for  his  outdoor  garments, 
and  his  snowshoes,  notwithstanding. 

'  'I  comme  across  from  the  pass  to  White  Lac  by 
short  cut,  an'  so  not  see  ma'm'selle  on  the  trail. 


THE  TRACKS  IN  THE  SNOW    167 

Mabby  she  get  to  lutrin  du  diable  before  la  nuit. 
Bientot,  I  fin'  her,  mabby.  I  go  back  there,  main- 
tenant.  Toi  stay  here,  Yvonne.  Et  toi,  Pitou, 
aussi,"  he  said,  with  simple  directness,  and  went 
out  into  the  night  again,  alone. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

Some  Freaks  of  Fortune 

Jules  Legarde  had  crossed  the  Lantowa  moun- 
tains by  Magician  pass  twice  within  twenty-four 
hours,  yet  he  started  forth  again  to  cover  once 
more  a  third  of  the  distance  and  return  without  a 
regret  for  the  great  fatigue  he  must  have  felt.  All 
of  his  energies  and  resources  were  fixed  upon  the 
one  thought  that  the  young  woman,  whom  he  knew 
his  master  loved,  was  in  danger,  and  that  he  must 
rescue  her. 

Old  Pitou  would  have  accompanied  him,  and, 
indeed,  did  follow  him  outside  the  door.  But 
Jules  ordered  the  elder  man  to  stay  where  he  was. 

"I  not  know  when  I  comme  back,  Pitou,"  he 
said,  "but  you,  eef  you  wanta  help,  go  back  to  Jan- 
ver  as  soon  as  eet  ees  le  jour,  an'  to  the  office  of  le 
chemin  de  fer,  on  the  square.  You  weel  fin'  behin' 
la  porte,  een  the  leetle  office,  un  sachet,  so  big"; 
and  he  demonstrated  the  dimensions  of  the  satchel 
with  his  hands.  "You  breeng  dat  sachet  ici,  to 
Yvonne,  tres  bientot,  an'  you  tell  her,  celer  il— to 
hide  eet  ver'  queeck." 

Then  he  went  swiftly  away  into  the  night. 

The  stone  house  under  the  mountain  near  White 
Lake  was  well  provisioned.  Jules  had  already  pro- 
vided for  himself,  and  eaten,  when  his  wife  and  old 


SOME  FREAKS  OF  FORTUNE         169 

Pitou  arrived.  Yvonne  very  quickly  prepared  a 
second  hearty  meal. 

She  had  overheard  the  directions  that  Jules  gave 
to  Pitou,  and  she  added  her  own  to  them  when  the 
old  man  returned  indoors.  They  were  merely  that 
he  should  procure  assistance  from  among  some  of 
his  own  people  in  Janver,  if  that  should  be  neces- 
sary, and  bring  the  laden  sled  with  him  when  he 
came  back  to  the  lake. 

It  was  characteristic  of  her  that  she  did  not  per- 
mit herself  to  worry  over  the  possible  fate  of  Joyce 
Maitland,  who  was  in  the  hands  of  God,  and  who 
would  be  spared  or  would  perish,  according  to  His 
will.  She  knew  that  Jules  would  do  everything 
that  was  possible  to  be  done. 

Meanwhile,  across  the  mountains,  in  Magician, 
other  things  were  happening. 

For  one  thing,  there  had  been  no  thought  in  the 
minds  of  Captain  Badmington  or  Sergeant  Hurley 
that  the  "breed"  would  have  any  idea  of  attempt- 
ing to  evade  the  temporary  confinement  to  which 
the  captain  had  sentenced  him.  That  the  Indian, 
who  had  a  quarter-strain  of  French  blood  in  his 
veins,  would  seek  to  escape,  was  not  even  thought 
of.  Nor  would  Lightf oot  himself  have  thought  of 
such  a  thing  but  for  Ben  Taggart. 

But  Taggart  had  made  a  disquieting  discovery 
since  the  occurrences  of  the  scene  at  Buxton's 
store. 

Wadleigh,  before  their  departure  from  Janver, 
had  given  him  the  forged  deeds  and  other  papers 
and  documents  that  went  with  them,  to  carry. 
They  had  been  wrapped  in  protecting  oilskin,  also, 
and  Taggart  believed  that  he  Iiad  deposited  them 


170  UP  AGAINST  IT 

safely  inside  of  the  sheepskin  jacket  that  he  wore 
under  his  furs. 

The  packet  had  disappeared— or  he  had  left  it 
behind  him;  and  Taggart  could  not  remember, 
positively,  that  he  had  brought  it  with  him. 

If  he  had  left  the  packet  behind  him,  he  knew 
exactly  where  it  was,  for  he  distinctly  recalled 
having  put  it  down  upon  a  chair  beside  him,  in  his 
shack  near  the  railroad— and  he  did  not  remem- 
ber, to  a  certainty,  that  he  had  picked  the  packet 
up  again  and  stowed  it  away  in  his  jacket. 

It  was  not  to  be  thought  of  that  he  should  return 
across  the  pass.  Wadleigh  needed  him  in  Magi- 
cian. Every  circumstance  connected  with  their 
schemes  demanded  his  continued  presence  there. 
But  the  forged  deeds  were  extremely  important, 
just  then;  they  were  vital,  in  view  of  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  official  records,  and  the  death  of  Suth- 
erland, the  only  man  who  could  have  made  any 
sworn  statement  concerning  the  rightful  owner- 
ship of  the  right-of-way.  There  was,  now,  no  offi- 
cial who  could  deny  the  authenticity  of  the  forged 
documents. 

Already  Taggart  had  determined  as  soon  as  the 
hearing  before  the  captain  was  over  to  send  Light- 
foot  back  across  the  mountain  to  get  them;  and  so, 
when  the  Indian  was  led  from  the  room  to  be  im- 
prisoned, although  it  was  only  for  a  few  hours, 
Taggart  was  much  more  concerned  about  the  cir- 
cumstance than  was  Lightfoot  himself,  and  he  fol- 
lowed after  the  Indian  as  soon  as  it  was  possible 
for  him  to  do  so. 

No  key  had  been  turned  upon  the  prisoner.  The 
surrounding  hills,  the  deep  snow,  and,  more  than 


SOME  FREAKS  OF  FORTUNE         171 

all  else,  the  direct  orders  of  the  captain  of  the 
N.  W.  M.  P.,  were  considered  as  bars  quite  suffi- 
cient to  hold  him.  Lightfoot  was  merely  thrust 
into  a  small  room  by  himself  and  told  to  remain 
there  until  he  was  wanted.  After  that,  he  was 
left  to  his  own  devices. 

So  Taggart  had  no  difficulty  in  going  to  him. 

What  the  directions  were  that  Taggart  gave  to 
him  need  not  be  told  here,  for  we  already  know 
that  the  packet  which  Taggart  had  lost  was  safely 
reposing  in  one  of  the  pockets  of  Sergeant  Hur- 
ley's uniform.  The  fact  that  Hurley  had  tempo- 
rarily forgotten  its  existence  does  not  now  con- 
cern us. 

But  the  consequence  of  those  orders  was,  that 
very  soon  after  Taggart  paid  his  hasty  visit  to  the 
Indian,  and  talked  with  him  in  his  own  dialect, 
Lightfoot  glided  from  the  room,  and  by  skulking 
along  devious  ways  and  resorting  to  crafty  meth- 
ods which  only  an  Indian  could  have  employed 
successfully  that  day,  managed  to  gain  the  out- 
skirts of  the  town,  unseen,  and  then,  by  keeping 
the  drifts  and  the  foothills  between  him  and  the 
houses  and  streets  of  Magician,  to  remain  so,  un- 
til he  was  hidden  from  view  beyond  the  eastern 
entrance  to  the  pass. 

It  was  nothing  to  Taggart  that  Lightfoot,  by  his 
act,  had  defied  the  power  of  the  North  West 
Mounted  Police,  and  would  have  to  pay  dearly  for 
it;  that,  instead  of  one  day,  or  part  of  one,  in  nom- 
inal confinement,  he  would  probably  be  imprisoned 
for  months.  And  the  promise  of  money,  and  white 
whiskey,  overcame  any  scruples  that  Lightfoot 
might  have  had. 


172  UP  AGAINST  IT 

The  Indian  came  upon  the  trail  of  Jules  Le- 
garde  at  the  beginning  of  the  pass,  and  recognized 
it  as  perfectly  as  he  would  have  known  Jules'  fea- 
tures ;  and  he  followed  not  too  fast,  thereafter,  for 
he  had  no  wish  to  overtake  the  man  ahead  of  him. 

There  was  no  friendship  between  Jules  and 
Lightfoot.  The  former  felt  nothing  but  contempt 
for  the  latter.  Lightfoot  envied,  and  therefore 
hated,  Jules.  Once,  almost  a  year  ago,  Jules  had 
put  the  fear  of  death  into  Lightfoot 's  heart  for 
having  dared  to  raise  his  eyes  toward  Yvonne,  in 
an  expression  which  Jules  had  not  liked;  and  so 
Lightfoot  hung  back  upon  the  trail,  governing  his 
own  speed  by  that  which  he  believed  Jules  to  be 
making.  He  thought,  too,  that  Jules  would  be 
likely  to  turn  aside  toward  White  Lake  at  a  point 
midway  between  Devil's  Pulpit  and  the  foot  of  the 
pass  on  the  west  side  of  the  mountain,  for  every 
one  of  the  by-paths  and  devious  ways  among 
those  hills  was  as  well  known  to  Lightfoot  as  to 
Jules. 

It  was  Lightfoot 's  plan  to  hurry  onward  by  the 
very  shortest  way  into  Janver,  as  soon  as  Jules 
should  turn  aside  from  the  main  trail  across  the 
mountain.  Thus,  he  would  avoid  the  man  ahead 
of  him;  and  he  would  go  at  once  to  the  offices  of  the 
railroad  company,  on  the  square,  and  get  posses- 
sion of  the  small  black  satchel  that  m'sieu  Randall 
had  described  to  Captain  Badmington  at  the  hear- 
ing. After  that  he  would  go  after  the  small 
packet  which  m'sieu  Taggart  had  forgotten. 

Such  were  his  orders,  in  part.  There  was  also 
another  one,  which  concerned  a  certain  young 
woman  who  was  supposed  to  be  still  in  Janver. 


SOME  FREAKS  OF  FORTUNE         173 

But  that  was  to  come  afterward— after  Lightfoot 
had  stolen  the  small  black  satchel,  and  had  re- 
covered the  packet  of  papers  wrapped  in  oil- 
skin. 

The  Indian  felt  the  importance  of  the  confidence 
that  had  been  reposed  in  him  by  Taggart,  and  he 
looked  forward,  also,  to  the  unholy  joy  he  would 
find  in  the  white  whiskey  he  was  to  receive,  and 
the  money  that  was  coming  to  him  if  he  succeeded, 
which  meant  more  white  whiskey,  and  many  more 
unholy  joys. 

When  he  descended  from  the  summit  house 
toward  Devil's  Pulpit,  he  held  back,  believing  that 
Jules  might  stop  there,  to  rest  and  feed.  But 
Jules  had  not  done  so. 

Half  way  between  the  pulpit  and  the  bottom  of 
the  pass,  Lightfoot  came  to  the  place  where  Jules 
had  turned  off  through  a  narrow  gulch  that  drifted 
from  the  south  side  of  the  canyon.  It  was  the 
shorter  cut  to  which  Jules  referred  in  his  talk  with 
Yvonne  and  Pitou  at  the  stone  house. 

Night  and  darkness  were  not  much  more  than 
an  hour  away  when  Lightfoot  arrived  at  that 
point,  and  he  speeded  up  a  bit.  He  had  spied 
upon  Jules  enough,  in  the  past,  to  know  of  the 
rendezvous  near  the  lake,  and  he  thought  that 
surely  the  Frenchman  would  stop  there  to  rest, 
and  eat,  and  so  would  enable  him  to  get  to  Janver 
first.  Then,  half  a  mile  farther  down  the  pass, 
just  around  an  oblique  bend  in  the  canyon,  the  In- 
dian came  to  a  sudden  halt. 

In  front  of  him,  not  fifty  yards  from  where  he 
stopped,  and  stretched  at  full  length  upon  the 
snow,  asleep,  or  senseless,  or  dead,  was  the  furred 


174  UP  AGAINST  IT 

figure  of  a  woman  whom  he  instantly  recognized. 

That  first  glance  at  her  satisfied  him  that  she 
had  been  entirely  alone.  No  trail  but  her  own  led 
up  to  that  spot  where  she  had  fallen.  The  Indian 
hurried  forward,  and  bent  over  the  unconscious 
form  of  Joyce  Maitland. 

He  discovered  at  once  that  she  was  alive,  and 
that  the  intense  cold  had  not  yet  begun  to  bite  at 
her  nose  and  cheeks  and  lips,  which  were  the  only 
parts  of  her  person  exposed  to  it.  His  training 
told  him  that  she  had  only  just  fallen,  unconscious, 
when  he  Found  her;  that  she  could  not  have  been 
there  more  than  a  very  few  moments. 

And  that  was  true. 

Had  Joyce  been  able  to  keep  up  the  struggle  a 
few  minutes  longer  than  she  had  done,  she  would 
have  rounded  the  bend  in  the  canyon  and  come  in 
sight  of  the  pulpit,  and  so  would  have  been  con- 
scious, and  unafraid,  and  quite  able  to  protect  her- 
self, when  she  would  have  met  Lightfoot.  Or,  had 
Jules  gone  on  down  the  canyon  instead  of  turning 
aside  through  the  short  cut  toward  White  Lake,  he 
would  have  met  her  at  about  the  moment  when 
she  had  dug  her  way  out  from  beneath  the  boulder 
that  had  sheltered  her  so  snugly  through  the  pre- 
ceding night,  for  it  had  been  late  in  the  day  when 
Joyce  awoke  and  dug  her  way  out  from  under  the 
rock  into  the  open  air. 

She  was  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  geog- 
raphy of  the  pass.  She  knew  the  time,  too,  by  the 
slant  of  the  sunlight  among  the  crags  along  the  de- 
file, and  she  realized  that  the  hour  was  much  too 
late  for  her  to  hope  to  return  to  Janver  before 
nightfall,  even  had  she  possessed  the  necessary 


SOME  FREAKS  OF  FORTUNE         175 

strength  and  endurance.  Moreover,  she  had  been 
almost  twenty-four  hours  without  food,  and  she 
had  undergone  so  much  that  her  vitality  was 
sapped  to  the  point  of  exhaustion. 

She  knew  that  the  pulpit,  half  way  up  the  pass 
to  the  summit,  was  the  nearest  refuge.  She  knew 
that  there  was  wood  there  with  which  to  build  her- 
self a  fire,  and  that  food  and  coffee  were  always 
cached  beneath  that  safe  retreat.  That  was  why 
she  did  not  turn  back— to  have  met  Yvonne  and 
Pitou. 

So  she  left  her  shelter  under  the  rock  too  soon 
for  them  to  find  her,  too  late  to  encounter  Jules, 
and  just  in  time  to  fall,  from  faintness  and  exhaus- 
tion, in  the  path  of  the  approaching  Lightfoot,  and 
less  than  five  minutes  before  he  appeared. 

The  fates  played  strange  pranks  with  her  for- 
tunes that  day  and  the  one  preceding  it;  and  dur- 
ing many  that  were  to  follow  it. 

The  Indian,  Lightfoot,  first  looked  to  see  that 
her  nose  and  cheeks  were  not  beginning  to  freeze. 
Satisfied  of  that  much,  he  covered  them  securely 
from  further  immediate  danger  in  that  respect. 
Then  he  lifted  her  in  his  arms,  for  he  was  as  pow- 
erful, almost,  as  Jules  Legarde. 

For  an  instant,  after  that,  he  faced  toward  the 
pulpit,  which  he  also  knew  to  be  the  nearest  shel- 
ter. But  he  shook  his  head  and  turned  away  from 
it  again. 

She  was  lost.  Somebody  would  seek  her.  The 
pulpit  would  be  the  first  place  where  she  would  be 
sought. 

The  third  part  of  the  instructions  that  Taggart 
had  given  him  concerning  the  things  he  was  to  do, 


176  UP  AGAINST  IT 

and  which  seemed  to  him  the  most  important,  was 
here,  at  hand;  had  met  him  half  way. 

So  Lightfoot  turned  his  back  upon  the  pulpit, 
and,  with  Joyce  Maitland  in  his  arms,  smiled 
craftily  at  the  thought  of  what  he  determined, 
then,  to  do. 


CHAPTER  XX 

The  Great  Change 

The  "great  change"  came  some  time  during  the 
night  that  followed. 

It  is  spoken  of  by  different  names  in  various 
sections  of  the  great  Northwest,  between  the  for- 
ty-fifth and  the  sixtieth  parallels:  The  "great 
change,"  the  "Chinook,"  or  the  "big  thaw." 
Weather-wise  persons  in  Magician  and  Janver  had 
41  smelt"  it,  even  before  the  last  storm.  Buxton 
had  prophesied  it  to  Randall  soon  after  his  arrival 
from  across  the  pass. 

In  effect,  the  "great  change"  might  be  likened 
to  the  throwing  open  of  furnace  doors  to  scatter 
abroad  the  heat  that  has  been  confined;  to  meet 
and  overcome  the  cold  that  has  for  many  months 
locked  up  everything  with  snow  and  ice. 

The  "great  change"  is  wonderful.  The  snow 
and  ice  melt,  and  shrink,  and  disappear  before  it. 
Canyons,  gulches,  ravines,  gullies,  hitherto  impas- 
sable, and  bound  up  in  flint-like  ice  are  trans- 
formed into  torrents  of  rushing  waters.  Huge\ 
rocks,  immense  boulders,  uprooted  trees,  barriers 
of  silt  and  clay,  are  picked  up  like  straws  and 
moved  from  their  former  positions,  mowed  down, 
and  washed  away.  Great  trees  are  undermined, 
and  felled.  Nature  does  its  annual  houseclean- 


178  UP  AGAINST  IT 

ing.  Old  trails  are  closed  and  barred;  new  ones 
are  opened.  Topography  alters  its  details,  al- 
though it  rarely  changes  its  character. 

During  a  week  after  that  night,  Magician  pass 
was  not  a  pass  at  all,  through  which  anything  alive 
could  travel.  Whole  sections  of  the  M.  &  J.  R.  R., 
between  Bluerock  and  Nelson,  and  again  between 
Nelson  and  Magician,  were  torn  away  by  the  floods 
of  water  that  poured  down  upon  them  from  the 
mountain  sides.  Between  Janver  and  Carrolton, 
it  was  the  same. 

Everywhere,  telegraph  poles  were  prone  upon 
the  ground,  wires  were  down,  and  useless,  traffic 
was  entirely  paralyzed,  business  was  dead,  nothing 
was  doing. 

Everybody  waited. 

But  then,  everybody  was  accustomed  to  waiting 
during  the  first  days  of  the  "great  change,"  while 
Nature  was  housecleaning.  There  was  always 
such  opportunities  to  do  things,  after  it,  that  every 
one  could  afford  to  wait,  with  complacency,  and 
with  certainty. 

Over  at  Magician,  Dan  Randall  waited,  with 
what  patience  he  could  summon  to  his  aid,  passing 
his  days  with  Buxton,  planning  for  the  campaign 
that  was  to  begin  so  very  soon;  making  ready  for 
the  greatest  fight  of  his  life;  preparing  to  pit  his 
all  against  Wadleigh,  and  Taggart,  and  the  others 
—even  against  the  great  Lionel  Gregory,  him- 
self. 

Wadleigh  and  Taggart  waited,  also;  but  with 
manifest  impatience.  They  kept  their  counsel, 
and  they  avoided  Randall. 

Some  digging  and  delving  and  searching  had 


THE  GREAT  CHANGE  179 

been  done  among  the  ruins  of  the  record  office;  but 
it  had  been  done  by  the  police,  and  whatever  had 
been  found,  if  anything  at  all,  the  police  had  kept 
to  themselves. 

That  night  when  the  big  thaw  came — that  same 
night  when  Jules  Legarde  toiled  wearily  back  up 
the  pass  in  search  of  Joyce  Maitland  hours  after 
Lightfoot  had  discovered  her  and  borne  her  away 
—that  same  night  when  old  Pitou  took  Yvonne  to 
the  stone  house  at  White  Lake— Dan  Randall 
climbed  upon  a  step-ladder,  as  soon  as  Buxton  had 
closed  and  locked  his  store  door,  and  brought  down 
from  the  topmost  shelf  the  pouch-belt  which 
Peter  Gaffney  had  worn  about  his  body  when  he 
died. 

Dan  had  felt  that  something  was  inside  of  it 
when  Jules  passed  it  to  him  at  Devil's  Pulpit.  Mild 
curiosity,  nothing  more  than  that,  led  him  to  a 
further  examination  of  it.  Already  he  had  won- 
dered at  himself  for  having  misled  Captain  Bad- 
mington  in  regard  to  it. 

But  the  thing  that  he  did  find  when  he  searched 
the  belt,  and  when,  at  last,  he  comprehended  the 
full  significance  of  his  discovery,  left  him  staring; 
not  so  much  at  the  roll  of  many  sheets  of  thin, 
parchment-paper  that  he  held  in  his  hand,  as  into 
the  fire  that  burned,  red  hot,  in  the  stove.  Buxton, 
perched  upon  the  counter  opposite  him,  with  his 
briar  pipe  tilted  between  his  jaws,  remarked, 
dryly: 

"I  had  forgotten  all  about  that  thing,  Dan,  or 
I'd  have  taken  a  look  at  it  myself,  while  you  were 
outside.  What  have  you  found?" 

Randall  raised  his  head,  slowly.    Then  he  got 


180  UP  AGAINST  IT 

upon  his  feet  and  took  a  turn  down  the  length  of 
the  store  and  back  before  he  replied. 

"I  have  found  something  that  is  rather  wonder- 
ful, Bux,"  he  said.  "I  don't  think  I  can  deny, 
after  this,  that  there  is  a  destiny  that  shapes  our 
ends;  mine,  anyhow.  There  is  the  roll.  Read  it, 
when  you  care  to  do  so.  Not  now,  though.  For 
the  present  I  prefer  not  to  think  about  it— save, 
only,  of  the  main  fact  of  what  it  means  to  me. 
Lock  it  up  in  your  safe  for  me  after  you  have  read 
it.  I  am  going  outside  for  a  little  air." 

"Is  it  about  the  railroad,  or  the  cut-off,  Dan?" 
Buxton  asked,  accepting  the  roll  that  Randal) 
held  out  toward  him. 

"No.  It  concerns  only  me— and  that  dead  man 
who  was  called  Gaffney,"  Randall  replied,  and 
took  his  furs  and  went  outside  into  the  cold.  The 
great  thaw  was  yet  some  hours  in  the  future. 

Across  the  mountain,  in  Janver,  Jules  Legarde 
waited,  also,  and  it  was  indeed  a  bitter  time  of 
waiting  for  him.  Never  before  in  all  his  life  had 
the  stolid  patience  within  him,  that  was  his  great- 
est characteristic,  been  so  tried. 

Jules  had  not  found  Joyce  Maitland  that  night 
when  he  had  gone  back  to  the  pass  in  search  of 
her,  as  we  already  know.  He  had  gone  back  by 
the  short  cut— as  he  had  come  out  of  it.  It  was 
a  much  shorter  route,  and  brought  him  into  the 
pass  about  midway  between  the  pulpit  and  the 
place  where  Yvonne  and  old  Pitou  told  him  that 
they  had  come  upon  the  place  that  had  sheltered 
her. 

It  had  been  much  too  dark  in  the  canyon  for  him 
to  attempt  to  follow  a  trail,  but  he  never  doubted 


THE  GREAT  CHANGE  181 

that  Joyce  would  have  been  able  to  reach  the  pul- 
pit, and  that  he  would  find  her  there.  Accord- 
ing to  Yvonne,  there  had  been  ample  time  for 
the  ma'm'selle  to  do  that  before  darkness 
fell. 

He  traveled  so  rapidly  and  the  darkness  was 
so  intense  that  he  had  neither  time  nor  opportunity 
to  find  the  snowshoe  trail  that  Lightfoot  had  left 
so  plainly  marked  upon  the  snow  in  his  descent 
of  the  canyon. 

But  at  the  pulpit,  when  he  found  that  Joyce 
had  not  been  there,  he  made  himself  some  torches 
— several  of  them— and  started  out  again,  believ- 
ing then  that  he  would  find  her  somewhere  in  the 
snow,  frozen.  Thus,  almost  at  once  he  came  upon 
the  trail  of  Lightfoot. 

Jules  was  convinced,  then,  that  Joyce  had  been 
saved.  He  recognized  the  imprint  of  the  Indian's 
snowshoes,  exactly  as  Lightfoot  would  have  known 
his;  and  he  did  not  like  the  Indian,  nor  did  he 
understand  why  Taggart's  servant  had  followed 
him  so  soon  across  the  mountain  pass.  But  even 
Lightfoot,  bad  as  he  doubtless  was,  could  not  do 
otherwise  than  give  aid  to  Ma'm'selle  Joie;  and 
surely  Lightfoot  had  found  her. 

Jules  sped  down  the  pass  with  all  the  speed  he 
could  muster  to  his  aid. 

He  trailed  the  torch  behind  him,  occasionally 
flaring  it  above  his  head  to  make  sure  of  the  trail, 
and  to  know  where  the  two  had  met,  and  so  came 
at  last  upon  the  spot  where  Joyce  had  fallen,  and 
where  the  Indian  had  found  her.  He  read  each  and 
all  of  the  signs  as  plainly  as  if  they  had  been  set 
down  in  type  before  an  educated  man;  and  what 


182  UP  AGAINST  IT 

he  saw,  and  read,  amazed  him  at  first,  then  startled 
him,  then  angered  him  into  sudden  fury.  He  could 
have  killed  Lightfoot  at  that  moment. 

"By  gar! ' '  he  said,  aloud.  ' 'Dat  homme,  Light- 
foot,  heem  fin'  ma'm'selle  here,  after  she  have  fall 
down.  Alors,  heem  tak'  on*  hees  snowshoes,  an* 
hers,  aussi;  an'  heem  put  his  own  shoes  ovair  hees 
back,  an'  heem  put  hers  on  hees  pieds,  so  dat  he 
mak'  de  track  like  ma'm'selle 's.  By  gar,  heem 
think  heem  fool  Jules?  Non,  non.  All  that,  it 
mean  mauvais  beaucpup— ver'  bad— I  theenk, 
mabby-so.  For  why  did  Lightf  oot  go  off  dat  way 
by  de  ledge?  Not  for  ma'm'selle 's  good,  heem  do 
dat— No.  Ver'  well,  I  go,  too.  Je  suis  las;  but, 
I  go,  too,  jus' sam'." 

The  ledge  to  which  he  referred,  and  along  which 
he  knew  that  Lightfoot  had  borne  Joyce  in  his 
arms,  afforded,  in  the  summer  time,  a  short-cut 
pathway  to  the  station  at  Bluerock,  if  one  was 
afoot  in  the  pass,  and  cared  to  take  it.  Just  now, 
it  was,  or  should  have  been,  impassable. 

Jules  did  not  pursue  that  route  very  far.  Be- 
fore he  came  to  the  end  of  the  ledge,  he  encoun- 
tered a  barrier  of  snow  and  ice  which  effectually 
stopped  him,  and  in  the  darkness  he  could  not  de- 
termine whether  it  had  fallen  across  the  trail 
after  Lightfoot  had  passed  the  spot  with  Joyce  in 
his  arms,  or  if  it  had  crashed  down  upon  them  and 
buried  them  both  beneath  it. 

But  he  did  know  that  he  could  go  no  farther 
by  that  route,  that  night,  or  that  next  day,  or  per- 
haps for  weeks  to  come,  for  his  experience  told 
him  that  the  big  thaw  was  at  hand,  and  it  would 
be  utterly  impossible  to  find  Lightf  oot 's  trail— 


THE  GREAT  CHANGE  183 

if,  indeed,  there  should  be  one— after  the  dawn  of 
another  day. 

It  was  with  a  heavy  heart,  indeed,  that  he  aban- 
doned all  further  effort  to  rescue  Joyce  Mait- 
land.  There  was  literally  nothing  that  could  be 
done.  With  a  heavy  sigh  he  turned  back.  La 
ma'm'selle  was  in  the  keeping  of  le  bon  Dieu, 
now;  Jules  could  do  no  more.  Perhaps  the  In- 
dian had  managed  to  save  her;  perhaps  they  had 
both  been  buried  beneath  the  crashing  ice 
and  snow.  There  was  nothing  left  to  do  but 
wait. 

He  was  nearly  spent  when  he  started  to  fight 
his  way  back  to  the  little  house  near  White  Lake, 
and  he  chose  the  route  by  way  of  the  mouth  of  the 
pass,  which  was  less  difficult  than  by  the  shorter 
cut  that  he  had  used  before. 

Half  an  hour  later,  when  he  issued  from  the  pass 
at  the  entrance,  and  turned  toward  the  left,  he 
stopped  short,  sniffing  the  air,  much  the  same  as 
dogs  will  do  when  the  breeze  bears  a  remembered 
scent  to  them. 

' '  Le  grand  degel, ' '  he  murmured.'  ' '  Eet  ees  the 
chinook  weend,  for  vrais.  To-morrow,  when  the 
day  come,  I  cannot  go  to  Janver.  Tres  bien.  I 
will  go  now." 

Thus,  instead  of  returning  to  White  Lake,  and 
Yvonne,  he  bravely  turned  toward  Janver,  and  it 
was  a  weary  Jules,  indeed,  who  stumbled,  when  it 
was  nearly  daylight,  into  the  dismantled  kitchen 
of  the  house  from  whence  he  had  started  out, 
barely  thirty-six  hours  before.  Yvonne  had  taken 
everything  that  was  rightfully  her  own,  and 
Jules'.  The  place  was  almost  bare. 


r 
184  UP  AGAINST  IT 

But  even  then  the  faithful  fellow  did  not  rest. 
The  time  had  not  come  for  that. 

He  waited  only  long  enough  to  make  a  fire  and 
brew  some  strong  tea,  which  he  swallowed  at  a 
gulp.  Then  he  set  out  for  the  square  to  get  the 
little  black  satchel  from  the  office  of  the  railway 
company. 

He  admitted  himself  at  the  front  door  with  the 
key  that  Randall  had  given  to  him.  It  was  still 
dark,  outside,  although  day  was  almost  at  hand. 
He  wished  to  perform  his  errand  and  to  return 
to  the  house  to  rest  before  the  dawn  should  break. 

Jules  stepped  inside,  and  turned  about  to  close 
the  door  and  fasten  it  after  him,  and  as  he  did  so, 
that  sixth  sense  which  is  acquired  by  men  who  pass 
their  lives  in  the  open,  warned  him;  but  the  warn- 
ing came  too  late.  He  felt  a  human  presence* 
close  to  him.  He  half  turned  to  meet  it.  And 
then  the  blow  fell. 

Jules  Legarde  had  arrived  too  late.  Somebody 
was  there  ahead  of  him. 

And  that  somebody,  whoever  it  was,  had  heard 
his  approach,  and  had  laid  in  wait  behind  the 
door,  and  had  struck  a  murderous  blow  in  the 
darkness. 

The  door  opened  and  closed  again,  softly,  after 
the  blow  fell.  Somebody  passed  noiselessly  out- 
side; and  Jules  was  stretched  at  full  length,  sense- 
less, an  inert  mass  upon  the  floor. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

Things  Begin  to  Move 

Dan  Randall  waited  at  Magician  for  the  torrents 
of  water  from  the  melted  snow  to  sweep  clean  the 
mountainsides  and  make  them  ready  for  the  cam- 
paign he  intended  to  begin.  He  waited  with  ex- 
pectancy, and  determined  resolve;  waited,  know- 
ing nothing  of  the  things  that  had  happened,  and 
were  happening,  at  the  other  side  of  the  mountains. 

Ace  Wadleigh  and  Ben  Taggart  waited  at  Ma- 
gician, also,  and  for  the  same  things  to  come  to 
pass.  They  waited  apparently  in  sullen  silence, 
and  plotted  and  schemed  while  they  waited. 

Jules  waited,  too,  in  Janver,  for  that  blow  in  the 
dark  did  not  disable  him.  Consciousness  returned 
to  him,  and  soon  after  it  was  light  he  dragged! 
himself  through  the  hallway  and  up  the  stairs,  and 
finally  into  the  deserted  offices  of  the  railway  com- 
pany, admitting  himself  with  Randall's  key. 

The  satchel  was  not  there.  Jules  was  not  sur- 
prised that  it  was  not.  He  had  been  thinking! 
deeply  while  he  made  his  way  up  the  stairs.  After 
a  time,  when  he  was  somewhat  rested,  and  had 
partially  recovered  from  the  immediate  effects  of 
the  stunning  blow  that  had  fallen  upon  him,  he 
went  outside  again,  and  returned,  almost  unno- 
ticed, to  Wadleigh 's  house. 


186  UP  AGAINST  IT 

He  waited  there;  for  it  was  as  impossible  for  him 
to  go  back  to  the  stone  house  at  White  Lake,  now 
that  the  great  thaw  had  come,  as  it  was  for  Pitou 
to  come  to  Janver  for  the  laden  sled,  as  Yvonne 
wished  him  to  do. 

Cuthbert,  Crosby,  one  Masterson,  and  the  re- 
maining three  directors  of  the  railway  company, 
passed  most  of  their  time  of  waiting  at  Thomp- 
son's hotel;  and  somewhere,  if  her  life  had  been 
spared,  perhaps  Joyce  Maitland  waited,  too, 
Everybody  was  waiting.  Dame  Nature,  alone, 
was  doing  things. 

Jules  Legarde  was  the  first  to  brave  the  dan- 
gers of  Magician  pass.  He  started  out  to  make 
the  trip  on  the  morning  of  the  sixth  day  after  the 
thaw. 

There  were  many  more  dangers  to  face  than 
when  he  had  gone  over  the  pass  with  Randall. 
The  great  peril  of  intense  cold  was  almost  elimi- 
nated; a  thousand  new  ones  had  succeeded  it;  but 
Jules  faced  them  all,  as  he  had  done  before,  im- 
perturbably.  He  stopped  at  the  stone  house  at 
White  Lake,  on  his  way,  and  stayed  there  thirty 
minutes,  or  less.  Night  had  fallen  when  he  ar- 
rived at  Magician,  and  announced  his  presence  by 
a  gentle  tapping  against  the  rear  door  of  Bux^ 
ton's  store,  out  of  which  he  had  passed  on  his 
errand  just  one  week  earlier. 

It  was  Dan  who  opened  the  door  for  him.  Bux- 
ton  had  gone  out,  and  Randall  was  alone. 

"I  have  not  been  impatient,  Jules,"  Dan  said, 
as  he  admitted  him.  "I  knew  that  you  would  get 
to  me  as  soon  as  it  could  be  done.  I  did  not  look 
for  you  before  to-morrow  or  the  next  day.  Well?" 


THINGS  BEGIN  TO  MOVE  187 

"Eet  ees  mauvais  news,  m'sieu,  dat  I  breeng. 
Ver'  bad,  m'sieu.  Ver'  bad  theengs  have  happen. 
You  will  feel  dat  Jules  have  not  done  hees  devoir," 
Jules  replied,  sadly,  and  with  a  forlorn  shake  of 
his  head. 

"Do  you  mean  that  the  satchel  was  not  there, 
where  I  told  you?"  Randall  demanded. 

"Oui;  but  more.  De  sachet  ees  gone.  De 
theengs  you  weesh  me  tak'  to  White  Lac,  theem 
still  at  de  maison  of  m'sieu  Wadleigh,  in  de  shed. 
But,  ole  Pitou  et  Yvonne,  they  get  them  bientot, 
mabby-so,  an'  tak'  them  to  de  lac.  .  .  .  Mais- 
more,  m'sieu." 

"What  more,  then?     Tell  me  the  worst,  first." 

"Ma'm'selle  ees  gone,  aussi." 

"Whom  do  you  mean?  Miss  Maitland?"  Dan 
asked  coldly. 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"Where  has  she  gone?  How  did  she  go  away? 
Nobody  can  get  out  of  Janver  yet,  if  it  is  as  bad 
there  as  here.  Where  has  Miss  Maitland  gone?" 

"Je  ne  sais  pas,  m'sieu.  C'est  fini,  mabby-so. 
Peut-etre  eet  ees  la  mort.  Mabby  she  ees  dead, 
by  now.  Mabby  hot.  Mabby  Lightfoot,  when  he 
fin'  ma'm'selle  in  de  pass,  manage,  somehow,  her 
to  save." 

"Lightfoot!?  He  is  here,  locked  up,  at  the  bar- 
racks?" 

"Non,  m'sieu.  Pardon,  but  eet  ees  not  so.  Heem 
tracks  on  de  mountain,  in  de  pass,  that  nuit.  Jules 
saw  them,  for  vrais.  But,  I  tell  you  what  Jules 
theenk,  now,  m'sieu." 

"Be  quick,  then." 

"Listen,  m'sieu.    I  go,  dat  nuit,  to  de  office  of 


188  UP  AGAINST  IT 

de  chemin  de  fer,  for  de  sachet.  Bet  ees  morn- 
ing, but  eet  ees  nuit,  aussi  bien.  I  go  inside. 
Somebody  already  there.  He  hit  Jules  on  de  head 
— beeng!—  so.  Jus'  like  that.  Alors,  when  I  wak' 
oop,  eet  ees  still  ver'  dark.  I  go  oop  de  stairs  to 
de  office.  De  sachet  ees  not  there.  I  fin'  fresh 
snow  in  de  room.  Somebody  hav'  been  there; 
non?  Tres  bien.  WhoTiav'  been  there,  alors,  eef 
eet  ees  not  Lightfoot,  for  Lightfoot  hav'  just 
comme  ovair  de  mountain.  Ver'  well.  Eef  eet 
ees  Lightfoot  who  hav'  been  there  to  tak'  away 
de  sachet,  then  Lightfoot,  heem  escape  from  de 
snow-slide.  You  see,  m'sieu?  Parceque,  eef  de 
Indian  escape,  so  did  ma'm'selle  escape.  For 
vrai;  non?  Oui." 

"What  is  it  that  you  are  telling  me,  Jules?" 
Dan  asked,  wearily.  "Miss  Maitland  was  not  out 
in  that  storm  that  night.  What  has  Lightfoot  got 
to  do  with  it  all?  What  are  you  saying  about 
snow-slides.  Begin  at  the  commencement  of  things 
and  tell  me  clearly." 

"Ma'm'selle  was  out  in  de  storm,  m'sieu,  for 
true.  Oui.  She  see  you  cross  de  top  of  de  ridge, 
when  you  start  to  fin'  me  at  de  lac.  She  try  to 
call  to  you  from  de  maison  where  she  live,  but 
you  not  hear  her.  Bien,  she  go  to  Yvonne.  She 
fin',  there,  dat  you  have  gone  for  sure,  an'  that 
m'sieu  Wadleigh  have  gone,  aussi.  Alors,  she 
run  to  de  roun'  house  where  de  engines  are  kept. 
She  steal  one.  She  ride  to  Bluerock.  She  tak' 
de  snowshoes  of  Tom  Rodman.  That  mauvais 
storm,  eet  catch  her  in  de  pass,  but  she  fin'  shelter 
under  a  rock.  .  .  .  Yvonne  an'  Pitou  they  start 
to  fin'  her,  next  jour.  They  fin'  where  she  slept, 


THINGS  BEGIN  TO  MOVE  189 

safe  an'  warm.  But  she  have  wak'  up,  an'  gone. 
Eet  ees  then  almos'  dark.  I  comme  down  dej 
mountain  ver'  soon  from  thees  side,  past  de  pul- 
pit. Eef  I  hav'  keep  on  dat  way,  I  fin'  ma'm- 
*)selle;  but  I  tak'  de  short  cut  to  de  lac.  I  no^ 
fin'.  Lghtfoot,  heem  comme  after  me.  Heem 
go  on  down  de  pass,  past  where  I  turn  off  by  de 
short  cut.  Heem  fin'  her  where  she  hav'  fall 
down.  Heem  pick  her  up;  heem  carry  her  away 
by  dat  path  along  de  ledge.  When  I  get  to  de 
stone  house  by  de  lac,  Yvonne  she  tell  me  all  thees 
things.  Then  I  go  back.  I  fin'  de  tracks  in  la 
neige,  an'  where  the  snow  have  slide  down  ovair 
de  ledge.  I  cannot  pass  that  way.  Mabby  they 
buried  een  la  neige;  mabby  not.  Alors,  I  go  on 
to  Janver." 

Jules  stopped. 

Slowly,  little  by  little,  Dan  comprehended  the 
full  meaning  of  all  that  had  been  told  to  him;  but 
—and  the  pity  of  it— he  misunderstood  what  Joyce 
Maitland's  purpose  had  been  in  braving  the  storm 
of  that  terrible  night. 

' 'Joyce  saw  me  cross  the  ridge,"  he  said,  slowly, 
more  to  himself  than  to  Jules,  who  nevertheless 
was  listening  to  every  word.  "You  say  she  tried 
to  call  to  me,  but  I  do  not  think  that  she  did. 
Then  she  ran  to  Wadleigh's  house;  but  not  to  find 
Yvonne.  She  went  there  to  find  Wadleigh." 

"Peut-etre,"  Jules  murmured. 

"But  Yvonne  told  her  that  Ace  had  gone  away, 
and  that  I  had  gone  after  him,  and  she  stole  the 
engine  and  went  after  him,  to  save  him  from 
me." 

"Non,  no,  m'sieu.    To  save  you." 


190  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"To  save  me?  From  what?  From  whom? 
From  Wadleigh?" 

"Mabby  to  save  toi  from  toi-meme,"  Jules  sug- 
gested, mildly. 

' '  To  save  me  from  myself?    Oh,  no.    But  to 
save  Wadleigh  from  me?    Yes." 

"An',  maintenant,  mabby  ma'm'selle  is  lost, 
herself.  You  not  care  for  that,  m'sieu?  That 
mabby  ma'm'selle  ees  out  there,  een  the 
snow " 

Dan  turned  his  eyes  toward  the  faithful  servant 
and  there  was  such  utter  misery  in  the  depths  of 
them  that  Jules  stopped  midway  in  what  he  was 
about  to  say.  He  came  to  an  abrupt  pause,  and 
hung  his  head,  half  in  shame  that  he  had  dared 
to  take  such  liberties  with  m'sieu's  affairs. 

"Joyce  is  not  dead,  Jules,"  Dan  said,  softly. 
"If  she  were  dead,  I  would  have  known  it.  For 
her  soul  is  mine,  and  in  death,  it  would  come  to  me. 
No;  she  is  not  dead.  You  say  that  Lightfoot 
found  her?  Then  Lightfoot  saved  her.  Hush, 
now.  Buxton  is  coming.  You  need  say  nothing 
of  all  this,  to  him." 

Buxton  came  in  at  the  front  door. 

"Hello,  Jules,"  he  said.  "I  am  glad  that  you 
are  here.  Mr.  Randall  will  need  you,  and  at  once, 
I  think.  Dan,  I  have  just  found  out  something 
of  interest.  Lightfoot  escaped  from  the  barracks 
a  week  ago  to-night,  and  started  across  the  pass 
within  an  hour  or  so  of  the  time  you  sent  Jules 
away." 

"I  know.  Jules  has  just  told  me  as  much," 
Dan  replied. 

"Hurley  told  me  about  it,  only  a  few  moments 


THINGS  BEGIN  TO  MOVE  191 

ago.  He  made  a  remark  about  it  which  made  me 
sit  up  and  take  notice." 

"What  was  it?" 

"That  he  does  not  believe  that  Lightfoot  would 
have  thought  of  going  away  on  his  own  account. 
He  was  quite  comfortable  where  he  was.  Which 
means  that  Taggart,  or  Wadleigh,  or  both  of  them, 
sent  him,  doesn't  it?" 

"Very  likely." 

"They  heard  you  tell  the  captain  why  you  had 
sent  Jules  away.  They  jumped  at  the  conclusion 
that  the  little  satchel  must  have  contained  some- 
thing of  value— so  they  sent  Lightfoot  to  get  it. 
.  .  .  Did  you  get  it,  Jules?" 

"Non,  m'sieu." 

"Then  Lightfoot  must  have  got  to  it,  first;  eh?" 

"I  theenk  so,  m'sieu." 

"Dan,  I  don't  know  what  was  in  that  satchel, 
but  I  do  know  that  you  wanted  it.  If  Lightfoot 
got  it,  he  will  take  it  to  Taggart  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible. That  is  why  I  was  so  glad  to  see  Jules." 

Randall  nodded.  He  was  silent  for  a  time,  and 
the  others  waited.  Then  he  turned  to  Jules,  and 
said,  slowly: 

"I  want  you  to  pay  careful  attention  to  what 
I  shall  say,  now,  Jules.  This  may  be  the  last  op- 
portunity I  shall  have,  for  some  time  to  come,  to 
give  you  instructions." 

"Oui,  m'sieu.  For  anytheeng  you  say,  Jules 
ees  ready  to  serve  m'sieu." 

"I  know.  Mr.  Buxton  and  I  have  been  getting 
ready  for  what  is  to  come.  We  have  interested 
some  of  the  men  in  Magician  in  my  affairs.  Mr. 
Buxton  has  selected  others,  whom  we  are  paying, 


192  UP  AGAINST  IT 

to  fight  on  our  side.  Some  of  the  people  will  be 
here  within  a  few  moments  to  talk  things  over. 
I  wish  you  to  remain  and  hear  all  that  is  said.  Do 
you  understand?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu.  But  why  you  want  Jules  to  hear 
all  dat?" 

''Because,  the  moment  we  can  get  into  the  pass, 
we  are  going  to  begin  work  there.  Because  I  am 
going  to  fight  every  inch  of  the  way,  if  necessary, 
to  get  it,  and  to  hold  it,  and  to  keep  others  out 
of  it,  and  I  want  you  to  understand  exactly  what 
is  necessary  to  be  done  in  order  to  accomplish  all 
that." 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"Everywhere  along  the  lines  of  all  the  railroads, 
washouts  have  destroyed  the  grades,  torn  up  rails 
and  ties,  ripped  out  culverts  and  bridges,  and 
wrecked  things,  generally.  By  to-morrow  morn- 
ing construction  gangs  will  be  started  out  both 
ways  from  here,  both  ways  from  Janver,  and  south 
from  Carrolton,  and  north  from  Lonecamp,  on  the 
M.  &  J.  The  P.  &  H.  B.  people  will  have  their 
gangs  out  by  this  time,  in  both  directions  from  Al- 
lerton,  and  from  Lonecamp.  And  the  B.  S.  &  L. 
S.  outfits  probably  began  work  on  that  new  line 
they  are  building  into  AUerton,  two  or  three  days 
ago.  They  haven't  got  these  hills  to  fight,  over 
there." 

"Non,  m'sieu."  Jules  did  not  in  the  least  un- 
derstand what  was  coming,  but  he  did  know  the 
man  who  was  talking,  and  he  was  well  aware  that 
Randall  never  talked  idly. 

"Mr.  Buxton  and  I  have  figured  that  by  to- 
morrow night,  or  the  night  of  the  day  following, 


THINGS  BEGIN  TO  MOVE  193 

there  should  be  between  two  and  three  hundred 
men  at  work  along  the  line  of  the  P.  &  H.  B.,  be- 
tween Allerton  and  Lonecamp,  and  another  hun- 
dred men  within  reaching  distance  of  Allerton, 
to  the  west.  Then,  northwest  of  Allerton,  on  the 
new  line,  the  B.  S.  &  L.  S.  should  have  at  least  two 
hundred  men  at  work  within  a  distance  of  sixty 
or  seventy  miles.  Now,  Jules,  listen  closely." 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"There  will  be,  therefore,  approximately,  five 
hundred  men  at  work— experienced  men— within 
forty-eight  hours  from  now,  within  the  radii  that 
I  have  named.  I  have  already  sent  out  men  of 
my  own  to  find  them,  and  to  hire  them— for  double 
the  pay  that  they  are  now  receiving.  To-night  I 
will  send  out  more  men,  and  to-morrow  still  more. 
I  intend  to  hire  those  construction  men  away  from 
the  P.  &  H.  B.,  even  if  I  have  to  pay  them  three 
times  what  they  are  now  getting,  in  order  to  put 
them  to  work  over  Magician  pass  for  me.  Mr. 
Buxton  has  found  men  who  will  go  after  them  and 
hire  them  for  me.  By  doing  that,  I  will  not  only 
get  the  men  I  need,  but  I  will  cripple  old  Lionel 
Gregory  so  badly  that  he  won't  have  a  leg  left  to 
stand  on." 

"For  why  do  you  tell  Jules  all  thees,  m'sieu? 
Je  ne  sais  netting  'bout  all  these  theengs." 

"Because  I  want  you  to  understand  the  impor- 
tance of  the  thing  you  must  do  to  help  me,  Jules." 

"Oui,  m'sieu.    Tres  bien." 

"Along  the  M.  &  J.,  from  here  around  through 
Rickett's  canyon,  to  Janver,  and  from  there  to 
Carrolton,  there  will  be  another  two  hundred  men 
at  work  as  soon  as  they  can  get  on  the  job." 


194  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Oui." 

"Until  a  week  ago  they  were  my  own  men.  To- 
day, more  than  half  of  them  would  come  to  me  if 
I  raised  a  finger,  and  would  do  it  without  promise 
of  increase  of  pay.  But,  with  that,  I  believe  that 
nearly  all  of  them  will  desert  Taggart  and  Wad- 
leigh.  That  makes  about  six  hundred  men,  all 
told,  that  I  think  I  can  get.  Jules,  by  one  week 
from  to-day  I  want  to  have  every  man- jack  of  that 
six  hundred  in  Magician  pass,  at  work,  or  on 
their  way  there  to  go  to  work'.' 

"Say,  Dan "  Buxton  interrupted,  but  Ran- 
dall turned  sharply  upon  him. 

"You  wait,  Bux,  until  I  have  finished  with 
Jules,"  he  said.  "Now,  Jules,  unless  you  can 
start  back,  to-night,  to  find  Lightfoot— unless  you 
do  find  him,  and  so  recover  possession  of  that  little 
satchel,  and  bring  it  to  me,  or  to  Mr.  Buxton— 
unless  you  get  it  to  me,  with  its  contents  by,  or 
before,  the  time  I  have  named,  the  whole  business 
that  I  have  been  talking  about  won't  amount  to  so 
much  as  a  feather  duster  in  a  blast-furnace.  Do 
you  get  me?" 

"But  why  not,  m'sieu?"  Jules  asked,  quietly, 
and  apparently  unmoved  by  Randall's  vehemence. 

"BECAUSE  THAT  LITTLE  BLACK  SATCHEL  CONTAINS 
THE  MONEY  THAT  I  WILL  NEED  TO  PAY  THOSE  MEN; 
THAT'S  WHY?" 

"For  heaven's  sake,  Dan!"  Buxton  began  again. 
"Do  you  mean  to  say " 

"I  mean  to  say  exactly  what  I  have  said,  Bux. 
That  little  black  bag  is  the  throttle  of  this  steam 
engine,  and  we've  got  to  get  our  paws  on  that,  to 
run  it." 


THINGS  BEGIN  TO  MOVE  195 

"But,  Dan,  there  is  just  one  question  that  I 
have  to  ask,  right  now." 

"Out  with  it,  then." 

"What  about  material  to  build  with?  Rails 
and  ties,  and  spikes,  and  fish-plates,  and  about  ten 
thousand  other  things  like  that.  Eh?  What 
about  it?" 

"This,  Buxton.  The  material  is  right  where  I 
can  lay  my  hands  on  it.  It  is  mine,  and  my  money 
bought  and  paid  for  it.  Ace  Wadleigh  and  Tag- 
gart  will  call  it  stealing,  but  I  never  heard  yet 
that  a  man  could  steal  his  own  property,  and  be 
convicted  for  doing  so.  Oh,  I'll  beat  them  to  it, 
Bux,  don't  you  worry.  We'll  build  the  Janver 
Cut-off,  and  we'll  have  it  in  operation  before  snow 
flies  to  make  another  winter." 


CHAPTER  XXH 

Preparing  for  the  Contest 

The  meeting  at  Buxton's  was  over. 

Jules  had  remained  quietly  at  one  side  while 
Dan  Randall  was  giving  out  his  instructions  and 
general  directions  to  the  men  who  came  to  the 
store  that  night  to  enlist  under  his  banner,  and, 
apparently,  he  had  paid  no  attention  to  what  was 
said  or  done.  But  Dan  knew  that  not  a  word  had 
escaped  the  vigilant  shrewdness  of  the  faithful 
Frenchman 

The  entire  success  of  Randall's  plans  depended 
upon  two  things,  and  two  only,  now  that  the  title 
to  the  property  would  be  brought  into  question, 
and  that  Ace  Wadleigh's  claim  would  be  supported 
and  backed  by  the  rich  and  powerful  Gregory, 
with  all  the  force  and  power  of  the  P.  &  H.  B.  and 
the  B.  S.  &  L.  S.  railroads.  Gregory  practically 
owned  the  former.  Certainly  he  controlled  and 
directed  its  affairs;  and  it  was  authoritatively  un- 
derstood that  his  word  was  law  in  the  affairs  of 
the  latter.  And  the  two  things  upon  which  de- 
pended the  success  of  Dan's  enormous  undertak- 
ing were:  The  recovery  of  the  black  satchel  and  its 
contents,  and  the  winning  over  of  the  men  from 
those  two  companies  and  the  newly  organized  M. 
&  J.  to  the  employ  of  Dan  Randall  and  the  Janver 
Cut-off. 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  CONTEST      197 

Randall  had  not  spoken  idly  when  he  had  said 
that  half  the  men  of  the  M.  &  J.  would  rush  to  him 
if  he  so  much  as  raised  his  finger.  He  had  been 
their  master  since  the  road  was  rehabilitated. 
They  knew  him,  and  liked  him,  and  believed  in 
him. 

Nobody  has  ever  yet  been  able  to  determine  what 
quality  it  is  that  some  men  possess  which  makes 
them  " natural  born  leaders."  But  that  there  is 
such  a  quality,  and  that  men,  en  masse,  recognize 
it  instantly  and  flock  to  its  standard  whenever  op- 
portunity offers,  is  not  to  be  denied. 

Dan  Randall  possessed  that  quality. 

More  than  a  year  before,  at  the  time  when  the 
M.  &  J.  was  under  construction  through  Rickett's 
canyon,  the  "bully"  of  the  hard-rock  men,  when 
he  was  paid  off  and  was  about  to  take  his  departure 
with  his  fighting  crew  to  seek  other  jobs,  said  to 
Dan,  in  parting: 

' '  Weil,  good-by,  misther  Randall.  Whanever  ye 
want  my  husky-boys  to  worrruck  for  ye,  all  yez'll 
have  to  do  will  be  to  sind  worrrd.  Sure,  there 
ain't  wan  av  'im  that  wouldn't  go  plumb  to  hell 
f 'r  ye,  if  ye  should  ask  it— includin'  me  own  self." 

Just.no w,  at  the  critical  moment  in  Dan's  affairs, 
he  knew  quite  well  that  in  every  gang  of  men  in 
the  employ  of  the  two  railroads  he  would  have  to 
fight,  there  was  many  an  individual  who  had 
worked  for  him  in  the  past,  and  who  would,  there- 
fore, be  not  only  willing,  but  eager,  to  come  back 
to  him. 

He  knew  that  those  men  among  the  gangs  who 
had  not  actually  worked  for  him,  had  heard  off 
him,  and  had  talked  about  him,  and  that  not  much 


198  UP  AGAINST  IT 

argument  would  be  required  to  induce  them  to 
leave  their  present  jobs  to  come  to  him— particu- 
larly with  the  promise  of  increased  pay. 

Moreover,  he  believed  that  the  men  actually  in 
the  employ  of  the  M.  &  J.  would  bitterly  resent  the 
fact  that  he  had  been  deprived  of  the  presidency 
of  the  road,  and  of  the  power  that  went  with  that 
office.  He  believed  that  they  would  be  more  than 
half  inclined  to  go  on  strike  the  moment  they  heard 
about  it.  This  was  another  point  on  which  he 
counted. 

Above  all  things  else,  he  knew  that  he  could  not 
hope  to  build  the  cut-off  unless  he  could  induce 
nearly  all  of  those  men  of  the  three  railroads  to 
forsake  the  jobs  they  had,  AND  TO  COME  TO  HIM. 

To  the  lay  mind,  which  has  not  been  up  against 
such  a  proposition,  this  method  of  procedure  may 
seem  unfair— BUT,  in  railroad  construction,  every- 
thing is  fair  which  wins  out.  Dan  Randall  knew 
that,  too,  and  intended  to  make  the  most  of  it. 

So,  the  time  of  waiting  after  the  coming  of  the 
great  thaw  had  not  been  an  idle,  or  a  wasted  time. 

Many  a  trusted  messenger  had  been  selected  here 
and  there,  largely  through  the  advice  and  assist- 
ance of  Buxton,  and  had  been  sent  out  to  prepare 
the  way,  even  before  it  was  thought  possible  that 
the  messengers  could  get  through.  And  so  it  hap- 
pened that  Dan's  plans  were  well  started  at  the 
time  when  Jules  appeared  from  across  the  moun- 
tains. 

That  night,  after  the  meeting  at  Buxton's  store, 
other  men  were  sent  out,  and  the  short  speech 
which  Dan  made  to  them  at  the  close  of  the  meet- 
ing is  worth  recording. 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  CONTEST      199 

1  'I  am  in  this  fight  to  win,"  he  said.  "I  expect 
every  one  of  you  to  be  loyal  to  me.  Mr.  Buxton 
and  I  anticipate  entire  loyalty;  or  otherwise,  you 
would  not  have  been  selected  for  this  work.  But, 
if  there  is  one  among  you  who  has  now  in  the  back 
of  his  mind  a  disloyal  thought,  or  an  idea  of  any 
form  of  treachery  to  me,  for  bigger  pay,  or  for  any 
other  reason,  he  had  better  resign  now,  before  he 
starts,  for  I  shall  not  forgive  nor  forget  such  an 
act,  and  I  shall  show  no  mercy  whatever  to  any 
man  who  commits  such  an  act.  That's  all.  You 
know  what  you've  got  to  do,  and  that  I  expect  each 
one  of  you  to  do  it.  You  know  what  your  pay  will 
be,  and  what  the  extra  rewards  will  be  if  you  suc- 
ceed. I  don't  expect  you  to  work  miracles,  but  I 
do  anticipate  very  few  failures.  I'll  overlook  and 
forgive  failures,  or  partial  failures,  but  the  man 
who  turns  traitor  to  me  had  better  never  come 
within  reach  of  my  arm  again." 

It  was  midnight  when  the  meeting  broke  up. 

Jules  got  up  from  his  corner  and  stood  before 
his  beloved  master. 

"Je  suis  ready,  m'sieu,"  he  said,  simply. 

"You  may  start  in  the  morning,  as  soon  as  it  is 
light,  Jules,"  Dan  replied  to  him. 

"I  weel  start  maintenant,  m'sieu.  The  morn- 
ing may  be  too  late.  I  must  fin'  Lightfoot;  non? 
An'  I  mus'  get  de  sachet.  Ees  eet  not  so,  m'sieu?" 

"Yes,  Jules." 

"Mais  oui,  alors.  I  go  now.  Lightfoot,  heem 
likely  be  on  hees  way  down  here  already,  to  fin' 
m'sieu  Taggart.  Tres  bien.  Eef  heem  come, 
Jules  meet  heem,  somewhere,  mabby,  avec  the 
sachet." 


200  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Very  well,  Jules.    Go  now,  if  you  like." 

1  'An'  eef  I  fin'  heem,  I  kill  heem,  mabby?' '  Jules 
inquired,  placidly.  Buxton,  who  was  listening, 
smiled.  Dan  shrugged  his  shoulders. 

"No.    Not  unless  it  is  necessary." 

"But,  I  am  to  get  the  sachet  anyhow,  non?" 
Jules  insisted. 

"Yes." 

"Then  I  breeng  heem— the  sachet— to  you, 
m'sieu?" 

"Yes;  as  soon  as  possible." 

"An'  I  not  return  unless  I  breeng  dat  sachet?" 

"No.  Unless  you  know  to  a  certainty  that  it 
has  already  been  delivered  into  the  hands  of  Tag- 
gart  or  Wadleigh.  In  that  case " 

"Een  dat  case  I  get  heem  anyhow.    Non?" 

"If  you  can.    Yes." 

"Tres  bien.  I  get  dat  sachet,  bientot,  m'sieu. 
Eet  ees  fait  accompli.  Mais,  m'sieu,  dere  ees  un 
theeng  plus." 

"What  is  it?" 

Jules  hesitated.  He  had  been  told  to  say  noth- 
ing concerning  Joyce  in  the  presence  of  Buxton. 
But  still,  before  he  went  out,  he  felt  that  he  must 
refer  to  the  possibility  of  finding  her  with  Light- 
foot  and  detained  by  him. 

"I  spik  of  that  place  where  Lightfoot  went  out 
of  the  pass  by  the  ledge,  when  the  snow-slide  fall 
down, ' '  he  said,  diplomatically.  '  'What  weel  Jules 
do,  m'sieu,  eef  heem  fin'  dat  feller  what  was  weeth 
Lightfoot  when  dat  neige  comme  down?  Mabby 
dat  feller  hav'  need  of  Jules.  Non?" 

Randall  was  silent  a  moment.  Then  he  said 
slowly: 


PREPARING  FOR  THE  CONTEST      201 

"Jules,  I  am  sending  you  out  to  get  that  satchel, 
and  the  things  that  were  inside  of  it  when  I  left 
it  behind  the  door  in  my  office.  Get  it,  and  get 
what  was  in  it.  I  don't  care  how  you  get  it;  but 
get  it.  You  may  use  your  own  judgment,  and  act 
as  you  think  best,  about  everything  else  that  may 
happen. 

"Merci,  m'sieu.  Merci  beaucoup.  That  ees 
all." 

He  went  out  into  the  night  without  another 
word.  When  he  had  gone,  Buxton  turned  to  Dan. 

"What  the  dickens  was  Jules  talking  about?" 
he  asked,  puzzled  by  what  had  been  said  about  the 
snow-slide.  "Did  Lightfoot  take  somebody  over 
the  pass  with  him  when  he  escaped  from  the  bar- 
racks?" 

"No.  But  it  appears  that  he  met  somebody,  or 
found  somebody,  in  the  pass,  when  he  was  almost 
to  the  other  side  of  the  mountain.  Jules  found 
the  trails." 

"Who  was  it?    Do  you  know?' ' 

"It  was  not  any  man  that  Jules  knew,  evi- 
dently," Dan  replied,  evasively.  "Apparently  the 
trail  was  made  by  the  snowshoes  of  Tom  Rodman, 
the  engineer,  but  it  isn't  at  all  likely  that  Rod- 
man was  wearing  them  at  the  time.  Somebody 
had  taken  them  without  his  permission,  prob- 
ably." 

Buxton  was  chipping  tobacco  from  a  plug,  and 
dropping  it  into  the  hollow  of  his  hand  for  his 
pipe.  He  stopped  and  fixed  his  eyes  upon  Ran- 
dall. 

"Whoever  it  was,  you  know.  And  for  some 
reason  you  don't  want  to  tell  me,"  he  said.  "Is 


202  UP  AGAINST  IT 

that  quite  fair,  Dan?  We  ought  to  be  quite  frank 
with  each  other.  Who  was  it? ' ' 

"It  was  Joyce  Maitland,  Bux." 

"Good  God!"  Buxton  said,  not  irreverently. 
"How  did  she  get  there?" 

Bandall  shook  his  head,  and  made  no  reply. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

The  Last  Night  of  Idleness 

Buxton  was  seated  upon  the  counter,  his  legs 
danglfng  and  swinging  idly.  He  rolled  the  tobacco 
between  the  palms  of  his  hands  and  filled  his  pipe 
and  lighted  it  before  he  spoke  again.  Then,  very 
quietly,  he  said: 

"Don't  you  think,  Dan,  that  you'd  better  tell 
me  all  about  it.  I  do.  I  want  to  know,  and  you 
want  me  to  know.  You  see,  old  chap,  we  can't 
work  together  unless— well,  unless  we  work  to- 
gether. That's  about  the  size  of  it." 

"I  have  told  you  all  that  I  know,  Bux,"  Randall 
replied,  as  quietly.  "That  is,  all  save  the  news 
that  Jules  brought  to  me  about  Joyce  being  out  in 
the  snow.  And  the  account  of  that  which  Jules 
gave  me,  wasn't  very  clear.  It  was  apparently  all 
that  he  knew,  though." 

"Tell  me  again,  then.  I  wish  to  be  quite  clear 
about  it.  I  want  you  to  be  quite  clear  about  it, 
too,  and  I  don't  believe  that  you  are— now." 

"I  think  I  am." 

"Of  course  you  do.  Nobody  is  denying  that. 
You  love  Joyce,  don't  you?" 

"I  do— more's  the  pity  of  it." 

"Well,  so  do  I;  and  this  is  the  first  time  that  I 


204  UP  AGAINST  IT 

have  confessed  it  in  words,  even  to  myself.  And 
I  don't  say  'More's  the  pity  of  it.'  All  the  same  I 
know  that  in  my  own  case  it  is  hopeless.  She 
wouldn't  love  me  in  a  thousand  years.  Your  case 
isn't  hopeless,  only,  you  happen  to  be  too  blind, 
just  at  present,  to  realize  that  important  fact.  Now, 
go  ahead,  and  tell  me  the  story  from  beginning  to 
end.  Only,  tell  me  first  about  that  part  of  it  which 
has  to  do  with  the  information  that  Jules  brought 
to  you." 

"I'll  try,  Buxton." 

"Go  ahead.    I  won't  interrupt.'* 

"Jules  tells  me  that  Joyce  saw  me  when  I 
crossed  the  top  of  the  ridge  on  my  way  to  meet  him 
at  White  Lake.  I  stopped  there  for  a  moment  to 
put  on  my  snowshoes.  I  think  that  I  gestured  to- 
ward the  house.  He  says  that  she  ran  outside  to 
call  to  me.  If  she  did  so,  I  neither  saw  nor  heard 
her.  The  latter  would  be  impossible,  anyhow." 

"Naturally." 

'  'Well,  she  evidently  put  on  her  furs  at  once,  and 
went  to  Wadleigh's  house.  I  had  come  from  that 
direction.  She  probably  thought  I  had  been  there 
to  see  Ace— which  was  partly  the  fact.  There  isn't 
any  doubt,  in  my  mind,  that  she  was  aware  of  the 
fact  that  he  had  already  started  to  cross  the  pass. 
She  knew  all  about  the  row  that  had  happened  be- 
tween Ace  and  me.  She  knows  something  about 
my  temper.  She  put  two  and  two  together,  and 
she  made  a  rough  guess  of  it  that  I  had  started  out 
after  Ace  Wadleigh.  And,  she  knew  that  if  I 
had  started  out  after  him  I  would  get  him.  And 
she  knew  mighty  well  what  that  would  mean— or 
supposed  she  did." 


THE  LAST  NIGHT  OF  IDLENESS      205 

"Go  on." 

"She  found  Yvonne  at  the  house.  Yvonne 
must  have  told  her  enough,  or  admitted  enough, 
to  confirm  Joyce  in  her  theory  that  I  had  started 
out  on  the  trail  of  Ace  Wadleigh  to  overtake  him 
and  have  it  out  with  him." 

"Well?" 

"When  Joyce  left  Yvonne,  she  went  to  the  sta- 
tion. Since  the  big  snow,  we  have  kept  only  one 
locomotive  fired,  for  emergencies.  Tom  Rodman, 
pur  chief  engineer,  was  not  there,  evidently.  Tom 
is  a  great  friend  of  hers.  He  has  taught  her  a 
lot  about  running  an  engine  at  one  time  and 
another.  Joyce  didn't  find  Rodman,  but  she  found 
the  engine  and  she  ran  it  out  of  the  roundhouse 
herself." 

"What?" 

"That's  as  near  as  I  can  get  at  it.  The  switches 
were  probably  set  all  right." 

"But,  why?    Why,  man,  why?" 

"Great  heaven,  Bux,  could  there  be  more  than 
one  reason  why?  To  overtake  Wadleigh  and 
warn  him;  or  to  intercept  me,  and  so  prevent  me 
from  following  him  and  killing  him.  That's  why." 

"To  prevent  you  from  following  Ace  Wadleigh 
and  killing  him— yes.  But  it  was  ten  thousand 
times  more  to  prevent  you  from  committing  the 
deed  than  to  save  him  from  being  the  victim  of  it, 
Dan  Randall." 

"Rot!" 

"Go  ahead.    What  happened  after  that?" 

"I  don't  know.  Nobody  knows,  but  Lightfoot^ 
and  Joyce  herself." 

'  'What  do  you  know?  What  did  Jules  tell  you?" 


206  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Yvonne  and  old  Pitou  went  in  search  of  her 
after  they  found  out  that  she  had  taken  the  engine 
from  the  roundhouse.  They  found  her  trail,  and 
also  a  hole  under  a  rock  where  she  had  slept  in 
safety  through  the  storm  of  that  night.  They 
figured  that  she  had  already  made  Devil's  Pulpit, 
They  knew  that  there  was  food  and  fuel  there. 
They  thought  she  would  be  safe  till  another  morn- 
ing. It  was  too  late  for  them  to  follow  her  that 
night.  They  went  to  the  stone  house  at  White 
Lake.  They  found  Jules  there.  He  had  passed 
the  pulpit,  and  knew  that  Joyce  had  not  been 
there,  so,  tired  as  he  was,  he  started  out  again  to 
find  her." 

"Dan,  Jules  is  the  bravest  and  most  faithful 
human  being  I  ever  knew,"  Buxton  exclaimed, 
warmly. 

"He  is.    Jules  is  Jules.    All  is  said  with  that." 

"Yes." 

"He  found  Lightfoot 's  trail,  first.  Then  he 
found  where  the  Indian  had  come  upon  Joyce.  She 
had  fallen  down,  apparently.  Lightfoot  changed 
Rodman's  snowshoes  that  she  was  wearing  to  his 
own  feet,  lifted  her  up,  and  carried  her  away;  and 
—don't  you  see  that  Joyce  must  have  been  alive 
and  practically  unharmed,  or  he  wouldn't  have 
done  that!  He'd  have  left  her  where  he  found  her, 
otherwise.  He's  an  Indian." 

"I  understand  you.    Go  on,  Dan." 

"You  know  that  pathway  over  the  ledge,  half 
way  down  the  canyon  from  the  pulpit,  don't  you?" 

"Yes." 

"Lightfoot  carried  her  out  that  way.  Jules 
took  the  trail.  But  just  where  that  big  stump 


THE  LAST  NIGHT  OF  IDLENESS      207 

stands— you  remember  it— the  snow  had  slid  down 
over  the  ledge,  and  had  made  it  impassable.  Jules 
couldn't  go  any  further.  He  turned  back.  There 
wasn't  anything  else  to  do." 

"No."  ' 

"He  hit  the  Chinook  wind  when  he  struck  the 
mouth  of  the  canyon.  He  knew  that  the  thaw  was 
on,  and  that  if  he  waited  until  the  next  day  he 
might  not  be  able  to  get  to  Janver.  He  was  after 
that  satchel.  So,  instead  of  returning  to  the  lake, 
he  made  straight  for  Janver.  Somebody  hit  him 
a  blow  on  the  back  of  his  head  when,  a  little  before 
daylight,  he  let  himself  into  the  building.  When 
he  came  to,  and  crawled  up  the  stairs  to  the  office, 
the  satchel  was  gone. 

Buxton  nodded. 

"Jules  put  two  and  two  together  again,"  Dan 
continued.  "He  figured  it  out  that  Lightfoot  was 
the  only  one  who  could  have  been  there  at  that 
time,  to  hit  him,  and  also  the  only  one  who  would 
have  had  any  reason  to  hit  him,  being  there.  And 
so,  if  Lightfoot  was  there,  he  escaped  the  snow- 
slide.  If  he  escaped  it,  so  did  Joyce." 

"Go  on.    That  isn't  all." 

"No." 

"Jules  was  tied  up  in  Janver,  after  that,  as 
everybody  else  was  tied  up,  wherever  one  hap- 
pened to  be.  But  he  found  out  several  things." 

"What— for  instance?" 

"Joyce  had  not  been  brought  back  to  Janver, 
so  Lightfoot  had  hidden  her  away,  somewhere  else 
and " 

"Good  heavens,  man,  hasn't  it  occurred  to  you 
that  she  might  be— might  be " 


208  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"No,  it  hasn't.  She  can't  be.  She  is  not  dead, 
or  I  would  know  it.  I  know  that  she  is  alive,  just 
as  well  as  I  know  that  you  are  alive,  Burch  Buxton. 
If  she  were  dead,  if  anything  had  happened  ten 
her— 7  would  know  it.  That's  all." 

"What  would  induce  Lightfoot  to  hide  her 
away,  anywhere,  and  hold  her.  I'd  like  to  know. 
What  the  devil " 

"Wadleigh  would.  Taggart  would,  if  he 
thought  he  could  get  one  on  me  by  doing  it.  You 
don't  suppose  that  the  satchel  business  was  the 
only  commission  that  Taggart  gave  to  Lightfoot 
when  he  sent  him  over  the  mountains,  do  you? 
Taggart  didn't  know  what  that  satchel  contained. 
He  was  only  curious  about  that.  I  had  said  that 
it  was  valuable  to  me,  that  was  all.  He  wanted  to 
get  possession  of  it  on  general  principles.  But 
you  can  bet  your  bottom  dollar  that  the  most  im- 
portant errand  that  the  Indian  had  to  do  when 
he  was  sent  over  the  mountain  was  to  carry 
some  sort  of  message  of  information  to  Joyce  Mait- 
land." 

"But,  great  Jehosephat,  Dan!  Why  would 
Lightfoot  carry  her  away  and  hide  her " 

"He  didn't  hide  her."' 

"But  you  just  now  said  that  you  thought  he  had 
done  that  very  thing.  And  don't  you  realize  the 
danger  that  Joyce  would  be  in,  alone  in  the  moun- 
tains with  such  a  double-dyed  scoundrel  as  that 
Lightfoot  is?  Why,  Dan " 

"Hold  on  a  minute,  Bux.  I  have  thought  it  all 
out.  I  thought  it  out  in  about  a  minute,  as  soon 
as  I  knew  about  it.  She  isn't  hidden  away  any- 
where without  her  own  consent.  She  is  as  safe 


THE  LAST  NIGHT  OF  IDLENESS      209 

with  Lightfoot,  under  the  circumstances,  as  she 
would  be  with  you  or  me.  Lightfoot  is  acting* 
under  orders,  and  Joyce  is  giving  these  orders  just 
now.  You  can  bet  on  that." 

"Dan,  for  a  man  who  is  uniformly  sensible,  and 
sometimes  really  brilliant,  you  can  on  occasion,  be 
more  different  kinds  of  a  damf ool  than  any  person 
I  ever  happened  to  meet  .  You  think  that  Joycei 
has  betrayed  you,  while  all  the  time " 

"Wait,  Bux.    I've  got  to  interrupt  you  again." 

"Well?" 

"I  came  down  from  Carrolton  after  that  other 
storm,  when  nobody— Wadleigh,  and  Taggart,  and 
Joyce,  least  of  all— believed  for  a  moment  that  I 
would  even  attempt  to  get  through,  let  alone 
make  it'.' 

"Well,  you  did  make  it." 

"Yes.  I  made  it.  An  engine  took  me  from  Car- 
rolton to  Powelton— to  a  point  about  two  miles 
this  side  of  it,  where  we  ran  into  drifts  that  were 
as  solid  as  rocks.  From  there  I  fought  and  dug 
and  shoveled  my  way  through  as  far  as  Hopesend, 
which,  for  the  first  time  in  my  life,  I  thought  was 
well;  named.  I  stayed  there  twelve  hours,  and 
started  on  again.  I  made  Corinseca,  somehow,  and 
from  there  I  cut  across  into  Janver.  I  got  in  at 
night— too  late  to  go  to  see  Joyce  at  her  home. 
But  I  called  her  up  on  the  phone.  Got  that  ? ' ' 

"Yes." 

"I  told  her  a  lot  of  things  over  the  telephone 
that  I  should  have  kept  to  myself— principally 
about  the  Cut-off.  Get  me?" 

"Of  course  I  understand  you." 

"Well,  put  this  into  your  pipe  and  smoke  it.  The 


210  UP  AGAINST  IT 

information  which  I  gave  to  her  over  the  wire  that 
night,  which  nobody  else  knew  anything  about,  was 
in  the  possession  of  the  whole  Wadleigh-and-Tag- 
gart  bunch  at  the  stockholders'  and  directors' 
meeting  the  next  day.  And  it  could  not  have  been 
in  their  possession  if  Joyce  Maitland  had  not  told 
it  all  to  Ace.  That  information  was  used  against 
me.  My  stock  in  the  company,  which  stood  in  the 
name  of  Joyce  Maitland,  and  for  which  I  held 
proxies,  was  voted  against  me  by  Ace  Wadleigh, 
who  held  later  proxies  from  her,  which  also  re- 
voked those  which  I  held.  Later,  she  appeared  at 
the  meeting,  and  when  she  understood  that  I  had 
been  ousted  from  everything  that  concerned  the 
company,  she  seemed  quite  well  satisfied  that  it 
was  so.  Still  later,  when  I  was  giving  Wadleigh 
the  thrashing  that  he  so  well  deserved,  she  entered 
the  office  behind  me,  jerked  the  whip  from  my 
hand,  and  struck  me  senseless  with  the  butt  of  it. 
Later  still,  when  she  saw  me  crossing  the  ridge,  in 
pursuit  of  Ace,  as  she  supposed,  she  started  out  to 
save  him  from  me.  And  still  later,  when  I  encoun- 
tered Wadleigh  at  the  ruins  of  the  record  office  in 
this  town,  he  admitted  to  me  that  it  was  Joyce 
who  had  knocked  me  down  with  the  quirt-butt. 
Now,  Buxton,  that  is  very  nearly  the  whole 
story.  It  isn't  quite  all  of  it,  but  it  is  enough. 
And  now  I'll  tell  you  exactly  how  I  feel  about 
it  all." 

"Well?" 

"I  love  Joyce  Maitland.  She,  deep  under  the 
surface  of  things,  loves  me.  On  the  surface  she 
does  not— and  just  now  it  is  only  the  surface  of 
things  that  she  is  seeing.  Wait.  Don't  interrupt 


THE  LAST  NIGHT  OF  IDLENESS      211 

me.  I  want  to  get  this  business  out  of  my  system, 
for  the  present.  Afterward,  we  will  not  refer1 
to  it." 

"Go  on." 

"Just  what  Wadleigh  has  said  or  done  to  con- 
vince her  that  she  does  not  care  so  very  much  for 
me,  and  which  makes  her  believe  that  she  does 
care  a  whole  lot  for  him,  I  don't  know.  Only  this: 
She  knows,  or  thinks  she  knows,  about  that  past  of 
mine.  She  knows,  now,  that  I  came  to  this  part  of 
the  world  a  fugitive  from  justice,  and  that  I  hid 
myself  away  in  the  Great  Slave  lake  country,  with 
only  Jules  for  company  because  of  that  fact.  What 
she  did  not  know,  or  did  not  find  put  for  herself, 
Ace  has  told  her,  or  helped  her  to  discover.  What 
she  doesn't  know,  now,  and  what  /  did  not  know, 
myself,  until  I  searched  that  belt  which  Jules  took 
from  the  body  of  the  dead  man  at  Devil's  Pulpit, 
is— well,  it  might  have  served  to  change  her  atti- 
tude. As  the  case  stands  now,  Joyce  has  selected 
her  own  course.  She  can  follow  it  just  as  far  as 
she  likes,  but  after  a  time  she  will  find  that  it  is  a 
pretty  rough  road  which  she  has  elected  to  travel. 
And  now,  Buxton,  we'll  drop  this  subject,  if  you 
please.  I'm  going  to  build  a  railroad  over  Ma- 
gician pass,  and  I'm  going  to  begin  it  at  once. 
I'm  going  to  build  another  one  through  Black 
gorge,  and  I'm  going  to  begin  that  one,  mighty 
bientot,  as  Jules  would  say." 

"There  is  just  one  thing  more  that  I  wish  to 
say  before  we  leave  the  subject,"  Buxton  said 
rather  sharply  as  Randall  left  his  chair  and  moved 
away  across  the  floor. 

"Say  it,  and  have  done  with  it,"  Dan  replied. 


212  UP  AGAINST  IT 

1  'What  if  Joyce  Maitland  is  in  trouble?  What 
if  she  is  dead?  What  if  Lightfoot " 

Randall  wheeled  upon  Buxton. 

"Great  God,  man,  don't  you  suppose  that  I  have 
thought  of  all  that?"  he  cried  out.  "Not  one  of 
tEe  things  you  would  suggest  is  possible  without 
my  certain  knowledge  of  the  fact.  This  is  not 
superstition.  It  is  heart-knowledge.  I  would 
know.  Deep  down  in  her  heart  and  soul,  Joyce 
Maitland  is  just  as  much  a  part  of  me  as  if  we  had 
been  married  to  each  other  a  thousand  years  ago 
and  had  passed  every  minute  and  second  of  the 
intervening  time  together.  Just  now  she  is  the 
victim  of  Ace  Wadleigh 's  deceptions  and  lies. 
Very  well,  let  her  get  her  fill  of  them.  Let  them 
both  go  the  limit.  But  she  knows,  and  Wadleigh 
knows,  for  I  have  told  them  both— this:  He  shall 
not  have  her.  She  shall  not  become  his  wife.  If 
their  affairs  ever  progress  as  far  as  that  point, 
Buxton,  I'll  kill  Ace  Wadleigh.  That's  all.  Now, 
drop  it." 

"But " 

"Drop  it,  I  say.  I'm  going  to  build  that  cut-off 
and  all  hell  shan't  stop  me." 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

Beginning  the  Fight 

The  busiest  man  on  earth  for  the  next  ten  days 
was  Dan  Randall. 

The  feats  of  travel  he  accomplished  were  amaz- 
ing. The  ability  to  organize  and  execute  that 
he  demonstrated  was  wonderful,  and  almost  unbe- 
lievable. The  tasks  which  he  performed,  the  de- 
tails that  he  met  and  mastered,  and  the  stunts 
he  set  for  himself,  and  did,  were  miraculous. 

Men  flocked  to  him  from  whatsoever  source  they 
were  sought  and  asked. 

Hard-rock  men,  skinners,  linemen,  mere  laborers 
with  more  or  less  experience  as  the  case  might  be, 
bosses,  foremen,  bullies— hard-boned,  square- 
jawed,  iron-thewed,  giant-muscled,  fighting  men, 
all— flocked  to  Dan  Randall's  summons  in  pairs, 
and  trios,  and  quartettes,  in  dozens  and  in  scores. 

They  came  from  the  line  of  the  P.  &  H.  B.  in 
squads  and  gangs.  From  points  to  the  eastward 
of  Lonecamp,  all  the  way  around  the  southern 
spurs  of  the  Lantowas  and  the  Badgers  to  Aller- 
ton  toward  the  west,  they  abandoned  their  jobs  and 
hastened  to  join  the  forces  of  the  man  they  liked 
to  work  for;  and  they  brought  reports  that  still 
others  were  coming  in  from  points  west  of  Aller- 
ton. 


214  UP  AGAINST  IT 

More  than  two  hundred  more,  all  told,  came 
from  the  new  line  of  the  B.  S.  &  L.  S.  that  was  un- 
der construction  from  AUerton,  northwest  to  Ki- 
chen-kah. 

Whole  companies  of  men  who  had  been  working 
for  the  M.  &  J.  (Randall's  own  property  until  it 
was  stolen  from  him,  as  we  have  seen)  threw  down 
their  tools  at  his  call— and  picked  them  up  again 
to  start  upon  a  joyous,  and  sometimes  hilarious, 
inarch  across  the  mountains  and  ravines  and  gul- 
lies and  streams,  to  help  to  build  the  Janver  Cut- 
off, and  to  fight  for  it  with  all  the  savagery  of  pri- 
mordial men,  if  they  should  be  called  upon  to 
fight. 

The  details  of  how  these  men  were  found,  and 
informed  of  Dan's  need  of  them,  are  not  neces- 
sary. 

The  messengers  and  agents  selected  by  Randall 
and  Buxton  to  do  the  preliminary  work  of  finding 
and  engaging  the  services  of  those  toilers  did  their 
work  well  and  quickly.  The  men  who  were  sought 
responded  with  enthusiasm.  They  flocked  to  him 
as  with  one  accord;  and  whenever  there  was  one  or 
more  who  hesitated  they  were  easily  and  quickly 
persuaded  by  the  others. 

With  advance  money  in  their  pockets,  and  the 
promise  of  double  pay,  and  sometimes  triple  their 
ordinary  wages,  on  the  job— and  with  the  prospect 
of  working  under  such  a  man  as  Big  Chief  Ran- 
dall, as  he  was  fondly  called  by  many  of  them— 
there  was  no  hesitation 

They  started.    They  got  there,  too. 

Wherever  it  was  possible  they  impressed  loco- 
motives and  flat  cars  into  their  service,  and  forced 


BEGINNING  THE  FIGHT  215 

the  engineers  and  trainmen  to  do  their  will  and  to 
take  them  as  far  as  the  rails  were  in  condition. 
At  wash-outs  (which  they  were  supposed  to  be 
there  to  mend)  they  deserted  the  lines  of  graded 
roadway  and  took  to  the  hills  and  ravines  for  short 
cuts.  It  was  like  a  rush  for  the  gold  fields  in  the 
old  days. 

Skinners  mounted  their  mules,  and  dragged  their 
scrapers,  bottoms  up,  after  them;  and  often  helped 
along  the  hated  "hard-rockers"  as  if  they  were 
brothers,  instead  of  the  sworn  enemies  they  al- 
ways were  when  on  the  jobs. 

Scores  of  other  men  of  all  classes  and  sorts,  went 
all  the  way  afoot;  and  there  was  almost  every  na- 
tionality under  the  sun  represented  among  them. 

Some  of  them  fought  their  way  from  points  near 
Allerton,  through  the  Black  gorge,  and  across  the 
Janver  valley  and  the  ridge,  to  the  western  en- 
trance to  Magician  pass.  Some  came  down  by 
way  of  the  ripped-up,  washed-out  line  of  the  M.  & 
J.  from  Carrolton  on  the  one  hand,  and  Nelson  on 
the  other,  to  the  same  point. 

Many  more  came  up  through  the  Janver  valley 
from  the  southern  bow  of  the  P.  &  H.  B.  and  others 
came  south  from  toward  Rickett's  canyon,  or  north 
from  Lonecamp  and  below  there,  into  Magician, 
and  so  to  the  eastern  entrance  to  the  pass. 

Buxton  deserted  his  store  and  went  over  the  pass 
to  receive  the  men  at  the  western  end  of  it,  with  a 
half  dozen  of  well-selected  helpers  to  aid  him.  Ran- 
dall took  charge  at  the  eastern  end,  near  Magician, 
because  that  was  the  point  where  trouble  was  most 
likely  to  occur. 

But  it  was  not  the  wonder  of  securing  the  ser- 


216  UP  AGAINST  IT 

vices  of  the  workers  so  much  as  the  marvel  of  hav- 
ing the  material  at  hand  to  work  with,  that  was 
most  amazing  among  Dan  Randall's  accomplish- 
ments, at  that  time.  He  had  proved  himself  to 
be  a  remarkable  planner  and  organizer  during 
those  ten  days  which  followed  upon  the  departure 
of  Jules  Legarde  from  the  store  in  search  of 
Lightfoot  and  the  little  black  bag. 

He  had  very  long  ago  foreseen  part  of  the  pres- 
ent emergency,  and  the  contest  that  must  come 
with  it.  Not  precisely  in  the  shape  it  had  taken, 
for  then  it  had  never  even  remotely  occurred  to 
him  that  his  own  railroad  company  with  Ace 
Wadleigh  and  the  others  would  be  among  his  op- 
ponents. 

But  he  had  anticipated  a  fight  with  old  Lionel 
Gregory  and  the  P.  &  H.  B.  people,  and  he  had  in 
every  possible  way  made  ready  for  that  fight.  In 
doing  so  he  had  builded  better  than  he  knew. 

If  he  had  really  anticipated  exactly  what  he 
would  have  to  meet  and  overcome  when  things 
came  to  a  show-down,  caution  and  care  might  have 
overleaped  themselves,  and  more  than  likely  he 
would  not  have  been  half  so  well  prepared  as  he 
was.  All  through  the  preceding  summer  and  fall 
Dan  had  been  getting  ready  to  build  the  Cut-off. 
He  had  worked  secretly  and  kept  his  affairs  to 
himself. 

He  had  ordered  from  the  East  and  had  had 
shipped  to  convenient  points,  ties,  and  rails,  and 
spikes,  and  fish-plates,  and  axes,  and  picks,  and 
shovels,  and  giant  powder,  and  dynamite,  and  ful- 
minating caps,  and  fuses,  and  drills,  and  sledges, 
and  stationary  engines  and  boilers,  and  dynamos, 


BEGINNING  THE  FIGHT  217 

and  wire,  and  lamps,  and  mules  and  horses,  and 
oxen,  and  carts— and  all  of  the  general  parapher- 
nalia and  what-not  that  is  required  to  construct  a 
railroad,  whether  it  be  long  or  short. 

He  had  managed  to  make  it  appear  that  all  of 
the  material  was  destined  for  use  in  making  gen- 
eral repairs  on  the  existing  line  of  the  M.  &  J., 
and  for  the  construction  of  the  proposed  and  here- 
tofore much  talked-about  extension  between  Car- 
rolton  and  Allerton. 

It  was  merely  a  happy  accident  that  Dan  had 
not  taken  Ace  Wadleigh  and  Taggart  into  his  con- 
fidence concerning  those  shipments.  It  had  never 
occurred  to  him  that  both  men  would  not  be  in 
with  him,  up  to  their  ears,  when  the  time  came 
for  the  actual  building  of  the  Cut-off.  He  had  in- 
tended to  make  their  fortunes,  as  well  as  to  add 
largely  to  his  own. 

But  it  had  been  his  own  money  that  bought  and 
paid  for  the  stuff,  just  as  it  had  been  his  owm 
money  that  had  financed  and  put  upon  its 
feet  again,  the  very  nearly  defunct  M.  &  J.  E.  at 
the  time  he  had  invited  'Wadleigh  to  go  in 
with  him. 

Dan's  only  idea  in  preserving  secrecy  concern- 
ing the  purchase  and  receipt  of  the  material  had 
been  to  keep  the  knowledge  of  it  from  old  Gregory 
and  the  P.  &  H.  B.  people;  and  Dan  was  a  thorough 
believer  in  the  idea  that  if  you  reveal  a  secret  to 
one  person  you  tell  it  to  all  the  world. 

So  even  Ace  Wadleigh  had  not  known  about  it. 
And  so  even  Joyce  Maitland  had  not  known  about 
it.  And  also,  the  shipments  being  many,  and  the 
points  of  delivery  being  likewise  as  many,  the 


218  UP  AGAINST  IT 

actual  quantity  of  the  material  had  not  been  sus- 
pected, and,  if  any  of  it  had  been  noticed  at  all, 
it  was  supposed  to  be  for  general  repairs  and  for 
ihe  extension. 

Fate,  destiny,  whatever  one  pleases  to  call  it, 
had  done  the  rest.  Luck,  maybe. 

For  surely  it  was  luck  that  had  induced  Dan 
Randall  to  dig  and  fight  his  way  for  more  than 
sixty  miles  through  the  snow  of  the  last  greati 
storm  but  one,  in  time  to  be  present  in  Janver  at 
the  directors'  meeting  which  had  so  glibly  voted 
him  out  of  his  own  property  and  possessions. 

Luck,  and  love;  for  it  had  been  the  strong  desire 
to  see  Joyce  Maitland  and  to  hear  her  voice  that 
had  induced  him  to  take  his  life  in  his  hands  to 
make  that  hazardous  journey.  He  had  known,  too, 
that  if  he  did  not  make  it  when  he  did,  there  would 
be  little  hope  of  his  getting  through  for  weeks  to 
come. 

And  so  he  had  arrived  in  Janver  the  night  be- 
fore the  meeting;  too  late  to  see  the  girl  he  loved, 
but  not  too  late  to  converse  with  her  over  the  tele- 
phone. The  fateful  consequence  of  that  conver- 
sation, and  of  the  stockholders'  and  directors' 
meeting  of  the  M.  &  J.  R.  R.  Co.,  we  already  know. 

The  workers,  as  fast  as  they  arrived  on  the  job, 
were  divided  into  "camps,"  and  "gangs,"  and 
"squads,"  each  one  with  its  accredited  leader, 
whom  Dan  selected,  and  these  were  sent  out  again 
to  hustle-in  the  piled-up  material  from  the  several 
depots  where  it  had  been  delivered. 

One  of  these  depots  was  a  station  twelve  miles 
south  from  Magician,  on  the  M.  &  J.;  another  was 


BEGINNING  THE  FIGHT  219 

Fairview,  fifteen  miles  to  the  north.  Still  another 
one  was  Bluerock,  across  the  mountains,  near  Jan- 
ver.  All  three  were  within  comparatively  easy 
access  to  the  two  ends  of  the  pass  over  which  the 
Cut-off  was  to  be  constructed. 

At  the  very  beginning-of-the-end  of  the  time  of 
waiting— to  be  exact,  on  the  very  morning  follow- 
ing the  departure  of  Jules  in  search  of  Lightfoot 
— Wadleigh  and  Taggart  decided  to  "beat  it"  for 
Allerton,  at  which  place  they  had  good  reason  to 
know  that  Gregory  would  show  up  at  the  first  pos- 
sible moment.  And  considering  the  general  con- 
dition of  affairs  it  was  important  that  they  should 
consult  with  him  at  once. 

The  idea  that  Randall  would  find  it  possible  to 
start  things  moving  without  delay  did  not  occur 
to  either  of  them.  That  Dan  would  have  the  har- 
dihood and  the  sand  to  seize  the  piled-up  material 
that  had  been  collected  at  the  various  points  was 
not  even  thought  of.  They  did  not  know  nor  sus- 
pect Randalls'  resources  financially  as  well  as 
mentally,  and  they  anticipated  nothing  more 
serious  than  a  fight  in  the  courts  over  the  title  to 
the  property  and  right  of  way  across  the  pass,  and 
old  Gregory's  known  methods  were  such  that  they 
only  smiled  complacently  to  themselves  whenever 
they  stopped  to  consider  that  point. 

Gregory  would  win  out  in  the  courts.  Never 
once  had  they  any  doubt  of  that.  And  while  he 
was  winning,  he  would  also  have  his  men  and  his 
money  working.  The  end  would,  therefore,  be  the 
same,  whether  Randall  should  succeed  in  proving 
his  claims,  or  should  not. 

"We'll  get  down  the  line  somehow,  to-morrow," 


220  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Wadleigh  had  told  Taggart.  "Randall  can't  do 
a  thing  here,  now,  any  more  than  we  can." 

"All  the  same,"  Taggart  replied,  "we  don't 
know  what  the  red-coats  have  dug  up,  out-a  them 
ruins,  Ace.  It  seems  to  me  that  one  of  us  ought 
to  stay  right  here,  on  the  job.  There  ain't  only 
one  of  us  needed  in  Allerton." 

1  'Nonsense.  You  can  leave  all  that  part  of  the 
business  to  old  Gregory,  safely.  He  will  know 
just  what  to  do.  In  the  meantime  I'll  put  a  flea 
into  the  ear  of  Badmington  and  Hurley  that  they'd 
better  go  mighty  slow  till  they  hear  from  the  old 
man." 

They  got  as  far  as  Holdup  without  much  diffi- 
culty. There  they  learned  that  below  Holdup,  and 
in  several  places  between  there  and  Lonecamp, 
were  washouts  and  bad  places,  which  would  make 
it  impossible  for  an  engine  to  get  through  for  sev- 
eral days  to  come.  So  they  took  horses. 

Before  they  reached  Lonecamp,  they  began  to 
hear  disquieting  rumors. 

The  men  who  should  have  been  at  work  along 
the  line  between  Holdup  and  Lonecamp  were  not 
where  they  should  have  been.  They  had  deserted. 
They  had  taken  their  tools  and  had  marched  away 
—and  there  did  not  seem  to  be  any  definite  in- 
formation as  to  where  they  had  gone,  or  why  they 
had  insisted  upon  going. 

At  places  where  gangs  of  twenty,  or  fifty,  men 
should  have  been  busily  at  work,  repairing  the 
roadbed  there  was  nobody. 

"It  looks  like  Randall's  work,"  Taggart  said, 
when  they  were  still  half  a  day  out  of  Lonecamp. 
Wadleigh  shook  his  head  and  said  nothing.  But 


BEGINNING  THE  FIGHT  221 

he  pushed  on  toward  the  junction  with  the  P.  & 
H.  B.,  which  was  the  southern  terminus  of 
his  own  road,  with  all  the  haste  he  could  com- 
mand. 

At  Lonecamp  he  found  the  information  he 
sought  in  an  entirely  unexpected  and  a  distinctly 
disturbing  manner. 

They  had  abandoned  their  horses  at  a  small  sta- 
tion fifteen  miles  to  the  north,  and  had  come  in  on 
a  hand  car  which  they  had  had  to  work  them- 
selves; and  because  of  the  difficulties  they  had  en- 
countered and  the  muscular  strain  they  had  been 
compelled  to  undergo,  and  the  natural  disquiet 
they  both  felt,  they  were  neither  of  them  in  the 
best  of  humors. 

As  they  pumped  their  hand  car  toward  the  sta- 
tion at  Lonecamp,  both  realized  at  the  same  in- 
stant that  there  was  a  disturbance  of  some  sort  at 
the  roundhouse  across  the  tracks,  and  they  has- 
tened in  that  direction.  There  they  quickly  found 
an  answer  to  every  question  that  had  been  puzzling 
them. 

Two  hundred  or  more  men  had  formed  a  circle 
around  two  of  their  number,  who  were  stripped  to 
their  waists  and  fighting  each  other  as  cats  or  dogs 
might  have  fought.  The  spectators  were  shouting 
encouragement  to  their  respective  champions, 
urging  them  on  with  joyous  cursings  while  near 
at  hand  a  steamed-up  locomotive  stood  panting, 
coupled  to  a  day-coach. 

Then,  high  above  all  the  noises  and  shouting, 
Wadleigh  heard  one  vociferous  voice  cry  out: 

"Go  to  it,  Mike,  you  red-headed  bobcat! 
Get  him.  Kill  him.  Give  him  the  heel!  It's  us 


222  UP  AGAINST  IT 

f 'r  the  Cut-off,  if  you  win!    An'  it's  me  for  the 
Cut-off,  anyhow.    Hurrah  for  Big  Chief  Dan,  an' 
the  Janver  Cut-off.    Yell,  damn  ye!    Yell!" 
Wadleigh  knew,  then,  what  the  matter  was. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

The  Fight  at  Lonecamp 

Wadleigh  and  Taggart  arrived  upon  the  scene 
just  in  time  for  the  finish. 

The  pitched  battle  between  the  two  bullies  was 
over,  had  been  won  and  lost  when  they  got  there, 
and  the  victor — the  one  whom  his  admirer  among 
the  onlookers  had  called  Mike— turned  his  grimy 
and  blood-stained  face,  of  which  one  eye  had  been 
effectually  closed  and  the  other  one  nearly  so,  first 
in  one  direction  and  then  another. 

"Sure,  if  there's  anywan  here  who  wants  a  bit 
av  th'  same  medicine,  now's  the  time  to  get  it," 
he  said.  "If  there's  anny  P.  &  H.  B.  skinner: 
standin'  around  fhat  wants  a  lickin'  step  up  to  th' 
captain's  office,  says  I." 

Nobody  responded. 

"Aw,  come  down  off'n  the  perch,  Mike.  Didn't, 
they  say  they'd  let  us  have  the  engine,  an'  no  ques- 
tions asked,  if  you  licked  Thibault?  So,  what's 
the " 

The  protester  stopped. 

No  one  had  seen  the  approach  of  the  two  who. 
had  arrived  on  the  hand  car.  The  excitement  at 
the  close  of  the  battle  had  been  too  intense  for 
them  to  take  note  of  its  coming. 

Seven  out  of  every  ten  in  that  crowd  knew  Ace 


224  iUP  AGAINST  IT 

Wadleigh  by  sight.  There  was  not  one  there  who 
did  not  instantly  know  Taggart— and  there  were  a 
good  many  who  had,  in  times  gone  by,  felt  the 
weight  of  Taggart 's  hands,  and  the  strength  of  his: 
muscles,  for  he  had  always  been  a  bully  of  bullies. 

It  was  Wadleigh  who  stepped  forward,  first,  but 
Taggart  came  up  beside  him,  and  said,  in  a  low 
tone,  before  Wadleigh  could  speak: 

"You'd  better  let  me  handle  this  bunch,  Ace, 
I  knew  'em  better 'n  you  do.  ...  What's  goin'1 
on  here,  boys?"  he  added,  raising  his  voice  and 
addressing  the  crowd  generally. 

A  dead  silence  followed  the  question. 

Every  pair  of  eyes  in  the  throng  that  had  gath- 
ered to  witness  the  fight  was  turned  upon  the  new-' 
comers;  and,  as  if  the  presence  of  these  two  men 
demanded  it,  the  two  factions  of  that  throng  drew 
apart  and  faced  each  other,  very  evenly  divided 
as  to  numbers.  Wadleigh  and  Taggart  stood  to- 
gether between  the  two  factions,  confronting  Mike 
Reardon,  the  victor  of  the  fight.  Thibault,  the! 
loser,  was  still  in  a  groggy  half  stupor,  on  the1 
ground. 

Reardon  grinned,  although  the  grin  was  a  literal 
facial  contortion. 

"Maybe  ye  can  see  f'r  yerself  wot  it's  about, 
Ben  Taggart,  if  ye '11  take  a  squint  at  Thibault," 
he  said.  "He  thought  he  could  lick  me— me! 
Well,  there's  the  answer.  Look  at  him." 

"But,  what  is  it  all  about?"  Taggart  insisted. 
"What  are  you  doing  here,  Reardon?  Thibault 
belongs  to  my  own  outfit;  but  you,  and  the  best 
part  of  that  bunch  behind  you,  are  P.  &  H.  B. 
What ?" 


"Not  on  your  life  we  ain't  P.  &  H.  B.,  Taggart. 
We've  sunk  our  last  drill,  an'  shot  our  last  blast 

f'r  ole  Lyin'  Gregory.  We're  on  our  way  to ", 

he  stopped. 

"Well,  where  to,  Reardon?" 

"That,  I  take  it,  is  none  uh  y'r  dommed  busi- 
ness, Taggart.  An',  say!  There  ain't  anny  wan 
of  my  bunch  that  likes  ye  anny  too  well,  so  ye'd 
best  not  be  shootin'  off  y'r  mouth  just  now,  too 
much  to  suit  'em." 

Taggart 's  reply  was  characteristic  of  him. 

Like  lightning  his  big  right  arm  was  drawn 
backward  and  then  shot  forward,  and  his  fist 
caught  the  half-blinded  fighter  squarely  on  the 
least  injured  of  the  two  cheek  bones.  And  Tag- 
gart's  fist  was  not  light  when  it  landed  in  that 
manner. 

Reardon  went  down. 

He  had  not  expected  the  blow  It  is  doubtful 
if  he  could  have  seen  it  sufficiently  well  to  have 
avoided  it,  had  he  done  so. 

It  would  have  been  far  better,  under  the  circum- 
stances, had  Taggart  permitted  Wadleigh  to  do 
the  talking.  Diplomacy  would  have  accomplished 
much  more  with  the  men,  in  their  present  mood, 
than  Taggart 's  tactics. 

And  Taggart 's  act  angered  every  one  who  saw 
it,  even  to  the  men  who,  otherwise,  would  doubt- 
less have  sided  with  him.  But  to  knock  down, 
thus  brutally,  the  victor  of  the  battle  that  had  just 
been  waged,  and  him  half  blind  from  the  effect  of 
Thabault's  blows,  was  more  than  their  sense  of 
fair-dealing  would  stand  for. 

A  dozen  men  from  the  line-up  on  Reardon's  side 


226  UP  AGAINST  IT 

rushed  forward  the  instant  the  blow  fell  and  the 
little  shouter  who  had  yelled  encouragement  to 
Thibault  only  a  moment  before  was  first  among 
them. 

It  was  he,  perhaps,  who  saved  Taggart  from  a 
terrible  beating  at  the  hands  of  the  crowd,  for  he 
dived  at  his  legs,  tripped  him,  and  dragged  him 
down  before  the  infuriated  men  could  reach  him 
with  their  hands  and  fists. 

The  men  who  had  lined  up  on  the  opposite  side 
made  a  half-hearted  effort  to  rescue  him,  but  suc- 
ceeded only  in  getting  their  heads  punched,  for, 
while  the  two  factions  had  been  about  equally  di- 
vided previous  to  Taggart 's  act,  the  cowardly  blow 
had  made  many  of  Reardon's  former  opponents 
transfer  their  sympathies.  Fully  half  of  the  num- 
ber who  had  championed  Thibault  sprang  instantly 
into  opposition  of  Taggart,  and  all  that  Taggart 
represented. 

Wadleigh  and  Taggart  were  hustled  to  one  side, 
forced  through  the  open  door  of  an  empty  freight 
car,  and,  despite  their  protestations,  were  told  to 
stay  there;  or,  if  they  didn't,  they'd  wish  they 
had. 

Ace  Wadleigh  had  not  lost  his  mental  poise  for 
a  moment.  He  saw,  and  read  between  the  lines, 
the  true  meaning  of  what  was  happening. 

The  fire-up  locomotive,  with  the  coach  attached 
to  it,  the  gang  of  men  from  down  the  line  of  the 
P.  &  H.  B.,  which  numbered  nearly  a  hundred,, 
their  evident  desire  to  get  north,  toward  Magician, 
the  plain  fact  that  in  order  to  do  so  they  were 
about  to  take  forcible  possession  of  the  engine  and 
car,  and  were  opposed  by  a  mingled  group  of  P. 


THE  FIGHT  AT  LONECAMP  227 

&  H.  B.  men  and  M.  &  J.  railroad  men,  told  the  tale 
quite  plainly  to  him. 

He  stepped  to  the  open  door  of  the  freight  car 
and  called  aloud  to  Reardon,  whom  he  knew,  per- 
sonally, and  in  whom  he  recognized  the  leader  of 
the  deserters. 

Reardon  had  not  entirely  recovered  from  Tag- 
gart's  blow,  but  he  was  on  his  feet,  nevertheless. 
He  moved  forward,  somewhat  unsteadily,  toward 
the  freight  car. 

"You  hold  y'r  gab  f'r  a  minute,  Wadleigh,"  he 
said,  thickly.  "I've  got  something  that  I  want-a 
say  to  Ben  Taggart.  Afther  I've  said  it,  I'll  talk 
to  you,  mebby." 

Taggart  thrust  his  own  bulk  forward  into  the 
car  door. 

"Well,  what  have  you  got  to  say  to  me,  Rear- 
don?" he  demanded.  "Just  some  of  the  same  old 
threats,  'cause  I  handed  you  one?  Eh?" 

"Just  that,  Ben  Taggart— an'  a  little  more  of 
it,  mebby." 

"Go  on,  then,  an'  say  it.  Get  it  put-a  your  sys- 
tem," Taggart  laughed  aloud,  derisively. 

"It  ain't  much.  Ye  won't  heed  it.  But  it's 
comin'  true." 

"Oh,  is  it?" 

"It's  this:  I'm  goin'  to  pay  ye  up  f'r  what  ye 
done  to  me,  just  now.  That  wasn't  no  square 
blow.  You'n  me  never  did  come  to  a  clinch.  Tag- 
gart, but  I've  always  thought  I  could  lick  ye,  an' 
some  day  I'm  going  to  do  it.  An'  whin  I  do,  God 
help  ye!  That's  all.  Now,  Ace  Wadleigh,  what 
have  you  got  to  say  about  it?" 

"This,"  Wadleigh  replied.     "I  am  now  the 


228  UP  AGAINST  IT 

president  of  the  M.  &  J.  That  engine  and  car  over 
there  across  the  tracks  is  my  property.  I  can  see 
that  you  and  your  men  are  determined  upon  taking 
them  and  using  them.  If  you  do  that,  you  will  do 
it  by  force,  and  riot,  and  theft,  and  I  will  hold  you 
accountable.  It  may  be  that  you  have  the  courage 
to  defy  me,  and  my  protest,  but  dare  you  defy  the 
law?  Dare  you  defy  the  authority  of  the  North- 
west Mounted  Police?  Answer  me  that.  For  that 
is  precisely  what  you  and  your  men  will  be  up 
against." 

For  one  instant  Reardon  hesitated. 

He  turned  his  battered  head  hastily  from  side  to 
side  to  get  an  idea  of  the  thoughts  of  his  followers. 
A  storm  of  hoots  and  jeers  came  to  him— hoots 
and  jeers  at  Wadleigh,  and  Wadleigh's  words.  A 
score  of  the  men  turned  and  clambered  into  the 
waiting  car.  Two,  who  had  qualified  as  engineer 
and  fireman,  jumped  into  the  cab  of  the  engine, 
and  one  of  them  pulled  the  whistle-cord,  emitting 
a  shrill  blast  of  defiance  at  Wadleigh's  words. 

"I  guess,  mebby,  ye've  got  y'r  answer,  Wad- 
leigh," Reardon  replied,  with  a  grimace. 

"Think  again,  Reardon.    You  will  regret  it.'* 

"Aw,  go  to  hell!"  was  Rear  don's  reply  as  he 
turned  away. 

"Wait  a  moment,"  Wadleigh  called  after  him. 
Reardon  stopped,  but  he  did  not  turn.  Instead  he 
addressed  his  own  men. 

"Pile  in,  boys,"  he  said.  And  he  watchedJ 
them  until  almost  to  a  man  they  had  done  so.  Then 
he  turned  toward  Wadleigh  again. 

"Listen  here,  to  me,  Ace  Wadleigh,"  he  said. 
"We  ain't  afraid  uh  you,  nor  of  y'r  one  hoss  rail- 


THE  FIGHT  AT  LONECAMP          229 

road.^  As  for  the  police— we'll  deal  with  them 
when  we  get  to  'em.  As  f'r  us,  we're  bound  f r 
Magician  pass,  under  orders,  an'  we're  goin'  to 
worrrk  f'r  a  man!  I  guess,  mebby,  ye  don't 
know  the  meanin'  of  that  worrrd  anny  too  well, 
but  if  you  and  Taggart  show  up,  up  there  at  the 
pass,  we'll  show  ye  what  it  means  all  right.  As 
f'r  the  engine  an'  carrr,  faith  I  won  the  use  of 
them  in  a  fair  fight  wid  Thibault  an'  even  you  can't 
deny  that  he's  in  charge  down  here,  and  he's  got 
the  say  of  what  shall  be  done  wid  th'  rollin'  stock, 
in  the  absence  of  written  orders  to  the  contrary. 
An'  it's  me  that  knows  that  there  ain't  another 
blessed  thing  here  that  belongs  to  the  M.  &  J. 
The  rails,  an'  the  ties,  an'  th'  hull  bloomin'  busi- 
ness around  here  is  all  the  property  of  the  P.  & 
H.  B.,  an'  you  only  have  the  use  of  it  because  it's 
the  junction,  and— aw,  what's  the  use.  To  hell 
wid  ye,  Wadleigh;  an'  you,  too,  Taggart." 

He  wheeled  and  climbed  upon  The  engine. 

"G'wan!"  he  ordered.  "Don't  ye  see  what's 
comin'?" 

He  pointed  up  the  road  toward  the  more  thickly 
settled  portion  of  Lonecamp,  and  all  could  see  that 
many  people  were  approaching  the  scene  at  the 
roundhouse,  and  in  front  of  those  who  were  coming 
were  two  red-coated  officers.  Somehow,  the  news 
of  the  disturbance  had  reached  the  village. 

Wadleigh,  from  his  raised  position  inside  the 
freight  car,  saw  them  also,  and  he  believed  that  he 
knew  a  way  to  stop  the  engine,  which  at  that  in- 
stant started  forward. 

He  took  a  flying  leap  from  the  open  door  of  the 
car. 


230  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Twenty  rods  distant  there  was  a  switch,  and  he 
knew  that  if  he  could  reach  it  before  the  engine 
did  so  he  could  derail  the  locomotive  and  ditch 
it. 

The  distance  he  had  to  go  to  reach  the  switch 
was  less  than  half  that  which  the  engine  had  to 
travel,  and  the  chances  were  in  his  favor  when  he 
made  the  effort. 

But  Reardon  saw  the  act,  and  understood  what 
it  meant. 

Half  blind  as  he  was,  he  did  not  hesitate.  He 
knew  that  if  Wadleigh  should  get  to  the  switch  in 
time  the  engine  would  have  to  pull  up,  and  that 
every  man  of  his  party  would  be  placed  under  ar- 
rest forthwith. 

"Open  her  up,  Wink!"  he  shouted  at  the  man 
who  held  the  throttle.  Then  he  climbed  through 
the  front  of  the  cab,  and  ran  over  the  boiler  until 
he  dropped  upon  the  cow-catcher.  In  his  right 
hand  he  held  a  stick  of  the  terrible  dynamite  to  the 
use  of  which  he  was  so  accustomed  that  it 
amounted,  in  his  hands,  to  little  more  than  a  play- 
thing. 

Wadleigh  reached  the  switch  while  the  now 
speeding  engine  was  yet  a  dozen  yards  away  from 
it.  He  half  turned  his  head  to  discover  just  how 
near  to  him  the  locomotive  had  got  before  he  at- 
tempted to  throw  the  lever. 

Reardon  had  figured  upon  that  very  act.  He 
was  prepared  for  it. 

He  was  standing  upright  on  the  cow-catcher, 
clinging  with  his  left  hand  to  the  headlight  and 
brandishing  the  stick  of  dynamite  in  his  right 
ha^d,  when  Wadleigh  turned. 


THE  FIGHT  AT  LONECAMP  231 

"If  ye  touch  that  switch,  I'll  blow  ye  to  hell, 
Wadleigh!"  Reardon  yelled  at  him. 

Wadleigh  saw,  and  understood.  He  hesitated, 
if  only  for  an  instant;  but  that  instant  was  all  that 
was  required. 

The  onrushing  engine  was  gaining  speed  with 
every  plunge  of  the  pistons.  There  were  only  the 
tender  and  the  single  car  attached  to 'it.  With  a 
roar,  and  the  rapid  spitting  of  the  exhausts,  engine 
and  tender  and  car  flew  past  him  and  out  upon  the 
track  that  led  away  toward  the  north— and  Rear- 
don, with  a  loud  laugh  of  derision,  tossed  the  stick 
of  deadly  stuff  to  the  ground,  at  Wadleigh 's  feet, 
knowing  that  the  slight  jar  would  not  explode  it. 

"See  how  near  ye  come  to  goin'  where  ye  be- 
long, Wadleigh?"  he  shouted. 

The  engine,  and  the  car  with  its  hundred  odd 
passengers,  flew  onward.  Reardon  clambered 
back  into  the  cab. 

"Wink,"  he  said,  to  the  acting  engineer,  "when 
ye  cross  the  bridge  over  Bear  creek,  slow  up  an* 
stop  her  about  a  hundred  feet  beyant  it.  Faith, 
they'll  be  gittin'  out  another  engine  an'  follyin'  us, 
if  ye  don't." 

"What  are  ye  goin'  to  do,  Mike?"  the  man 
asked  him,  uneasily. 

"Sure,  Wink,  if  ye  don't  know,  ye  won't  be  held 
accountable  for  it,  will  ye?  An'  if  there  ain't  anny 
bridge  there  to  cross,  f 'r  thim  that  takes  after  us, 
they  can't  folly,  can  they?"  Reardon  replied,  as 
he  reached  into  his  kit  for  more  of  the  dynamite. 


CHAPTER  XXVI 
The  Voices  Over  the  Wire 

Midnight. 

A  chain  of  electric  lights  gleamed  brightly 
along  the  entire  length  of  Magician  pass,  from  the 
Y-shaped  entrance  at  the  eastern  end  of  it  to  the 
narrow,  small-end-of-the-horn-gateway-to-the-can- 
yon,  at  the  Janver  side  of  the  mountain. 

If  an  "old-timer"  had  been  dropped  down  there 
suddenly  and  without  warning,  and  with  no  in- 
formation of  what  was  going  forward,  he  would 
have  stood  appalled. 

In  the  glaring  arc-lights,  the  flare  of  the  forges, 
and  the  light  of  the  gleaming  camp  fires  and  cook 
fires,  human  figures  flitted  about,  horses  and  mules 
labored,  the  clatter  of  rock-drills  echoed  and  re- 
echoed among  the  crags  and  rocks,  the  voices  of 
teamsters  sounded  raucously  upon  the  night  air. 
The  general  din  made  by  hundreds  of  laboring 
men  at  work  told  plainly  enough  that  some  great 
enterprise  as  going  forward  with  all  the  energy 
and  speed  that  the  will  of  a  determined  leader 
could  bring  to  bear  upon  the  occasion. 

The  Janver  Cut-off  was  being  built  with  a  speed 
and  energy  that  was  phenomenal. 

The  scene  of  the  small  fight  between  two  men,  at 
Lonecamp,  was  only  one  of  many  which  were 


THE  VOICES  OVER  THE  WIRE       233 

similar  in  character,  toward  every  point  of  the 
compass  from  which  either  end  of  the  pass  could 
be  approached.  And  they  came,  willing  and  eager, 
from  all  directions  at  once,  for  Randall  seemed 
to  have  imparted  his  own  superlative  energy  to 
every  one  of  the  hundreds  of  men  who  flocked  to 
his  support,  and  to  work  for  him. 

Many  were  sent  to  bring  in  the  stored  material 
from  the  various  depots;  others  began  with  their 
picks,  and  spades,  and  scrapers,  their  drills  and 
their  dynamite,  almost  before  there  was  time  for 
them  to  catch  their  breath  from  their  journeys. 

The  great  rock-bound  grotto  at  Devil's  Pulpit 
was  turned  into  an  engine  room  for  dynamos  and 
cable  machinery.  Wood  was  stripped  from  the 
mountainsides  for  fuel,  and  within  ten  days  from 
the  time  of  that  fight  at  Lonecamp,  the  real  work 
of  blasting  and  digging,  of  leveling  and  filling-in, 
of  grading  and  remodeling  the  entire  character  of 
the  pass,  was  begun. 

Directly  across  either  -  end  of  the  pass  Dan 
erected  a  fort-like  barricade,  as  soon  as  the  mate- 
rial for  the  construction  of  the  road  had  been 
brought  into  it,  and  no  person  was  permitted  to  go 
in,  or  out  of,  either  of  those  two  inclosures,  with- 
out a  written  pass  from  him. 

Nor  did  outsiders  discover  that  there  were  such 
things  as  barricades  at  the  ends  of  the  pass  until 
days  after  the  actual  work  of  the  construction  of 
the  road  over  the  mountain  was  begun. 

The  reason  for  this  is  obvious. 

The  men  who  worked  for  Dan  had  been  drawn, 
without  an  exception,  from  the  employees  of  the 
three  railways  already  mentioned;  and  their  de- 


234  UP  AGAINST  IT 

sertion  of  their  former  employers  had  so  crippled 
the  opening  up  of  those  roads  that  they  had  been 
rendered  practically  helpless. 

It  is  true  that  Wadleigh,  after  the  scene  down 
at  Lonecamp,  had  been  made  to  understand  only 
too  well  what  was  going  on;  and  that  he  had  left 
Taggart  to  hasten  on  to  Allerton  to  see  old  man 
Gregory,  while  he  himself  had  lost  no  time  in  get- 
ting back  to  Magician  with  as  little  delay  as  pos- 
sible. 

But  even  when  he  returned  there  he  was  help- 
less. 

There  was  nothing  that  he  could  do. 

The  forces  that  he  would  have  worked  with,  the 
leverages  which  he  might  have  brought  to  bear 
against  Randall,  were  all  at  the  opposite  side  of 
two  ranges  of  mountains. 

The  railroads  were  impassable,  telegraph  wires 
were  still  working  irregularly  and  inaccurately, 
and  he  was  as  helpless  to  interfere  with  this  mas- 
terly preliminary  stroke  of  Randall's,  as  a  man  at 
one  end  of  a  telephone  wire  is  powerless  to  punch 
the  fellow  who  sasses  him  at  the  other  end. 

Day  by  day  Wadleigh  had  seen  squads  of  men 
arrive,  and  go  into  the  pass;  and  he  knew  that 
many  of  them  had  been  workers  along  the  line  of 
what  he  now  called  his  own  road. 

And  he  had  seen  them  come  out  again,  and  re- 
turn, later  still,  with  the  hoarded-up  materials. 
He  knew,  by  implication,  that  the  same  sort  of 
thing  was  taking  place  over  at  the  opposite  end 
of  the  pass,  near  Janver.  He  realized  that  Ran- 
dall was  thoroughly  provided  with  material,  as 
well  as  with  workers  to  use  it.  For  once, 


THE  VOICES  OVER  THE  WIRE       235 

Ace  Wadleigh  knew  himself  to  be  utterly  power- 
less. 

He  tried  haranguing  the  workers  as  they  ar- 
rived. They  laughed  at  him,  and  jeered  him — 
and  incidentally  told  him  some  unpleasant  truths 
about  what  they  thought  of  him— and  the  place 
they  considered  a  suitable  destination  for  him  and 
his  belongings. 

He  sought  Captain  Badmington,  and  Sergeant 
Hurley,  and  begged  them  to  interfere;  but  those 
two  officers  shrugged  their  shoulders  and  replied 
that  they  would  gladly  do  so  if  he  would  show 
them  sufficient  authority  for  the  act.  He  threat- 
ened them  with  dire  consequences,  and  the  wrath 
of  Lionel  Gregory,  if  they  insisted  upon  keeping 
their  hands  off,  but  they  only  smiled  and  repeated 
what  they  had  already  said. 

Nevertheless,  they  did  keep  their  hands  off. 

Personally,  they  both  favored  Randall,  and, 
while  they  would  not  have  hesitated  to  do  their 
duty  on  that  account,  they  nevertheless  refrained 
from  attempting  anything  that  was  not,  quite 
plainly,  their  duty. 

Wadleigh  finally  succeeded  in  getting  a  wire 
through  to  Regina,  with  a  full  account  of  the  pro- 
ceedings, and  begged  that  peremptory  orders  be 
forwarded  from  there  to  Captain  Badmington;  and 
he  received  the  curt  reply  that  Captain  Badming- 
ton was  perfectly  competent  to  attend  to  the  mat- 
ter on  the  ground,  and  that  no  such  orders  could 
be  sent  by  telegraph,  in  the  absence  of  more  ex- 
plicit grounds  for  forwarding  them. 

He  begged  the  great  Lionel  Gregory,  by  tele- 
graph, to  use  his  influence  with  the  Canadian  au- 


236  UP  AGAINST  IT 

thorities  to  bring  about  the  immediate  interference 
of  the  all-powerful  N.  W.  M.  P. ;  and  Gregory  did 
try.  But  Mr.  Gregory  had  no  better  or  more  ex- 
plicit information  on  the  subject  than  Wadleigh 
could  offer,  himself,  and  hence— nothing  could  be 
done  save  in  the  regular,  red-tape  manner,  and 
entirely  according  to  stereotyped  legal  procedure. 

Meanwhile  Randall  was  saying  nothing— and 
sawing  wood. 

During  that  time  of  enforced  inaction  on  the 
part  of  Gregory,  Wadleigh,  Taggart  and  others, 
and  of  the  crippled  railroads  and  wires,  Randall 
succeeded  in  accomplishing  all  of  the  necessary 
preliminary  work  of  his  big  enterprise. 

He  got  his  men,  his  topis,  his  materials,  and 
everything  that  he  needed,  on  the  spot,  and  he 
built  forts  at  either  end  of  the  pass,  to  protect  and 
hold  it— and  he  was  resolved  to  hold  it  against  all 
comers,  until  that  railroad  across  the  pass  was 
completed,  no  matter  what  might  happen  there- 
after. 

But  things  do  have  an  end— or  the  beginning  of 
one. 

The  B.  S.  &  L.  S.,  the  P.  &  H.  B.,  and  the  M.  &  J. 
railroads  brought  in  other  men  from  outlying 
points,  and  the  several  lines  succeeded  at  last  in 
getting  their  railroads  into  fairly  good  working 
order. 

Thus  old  Gregory  came  at  last  to  Magician. 

Taggart,  in  the  meantime,  had  crossed  the  Bad- 
ger Range,  through  Black  Gorge,  to  Janver— and 
Taggart  had  collected  before  he  started,  and  had 
taken  with  him,  nearly  two  hundred  daredevil 
fighting  men  of  his  own  selection.  For  Taggart 's 


THE  VOICES  OVER  THE  WIRE       237 

method  was  to  use  force  first,  and  the  law,  after- 
ward, and  he  meant  to  fight  and  force  his  way  into 
Magician  pass,  if  he  could  get  into  it  in  no  other 
way. 

Nor  had  Gregory  been  idle  in  that  respect. 

His  crafty  old  brain  had  been  plotting  and  plan- 
ning ceaselessly  during  all  the  time  that  Wadleigh 
was  burning  the  wires  with  information  of  what 
was  going  on.  The  great  man  had  done  some  of 
the  same  sort  of  burning,  although  his  operations 
might  better  have  been  called  "pulling  wires," 
rather  than  "burning"  them.  Nor  did  he  ride 
into  Magician  in  his  special  car,  unattended. 
Within  an  hour  or  so  after  him,  there  arrived  an- 
other special  which  brought  three  hundred  more 
workers— and  fighters,  if  they  should  be  called 
upon  to  fight. 

He  had  about  the  same  ideas  for  an  attack  at 
the  eastern  end  of  the  pass  as  Taggart  had  consid- 
ered for  the  western  end  of  it.  Gregory  and  Tag- 
gart had  understood  each  other  fairly  well  before 
they  separated. 

Also,  and  not  to  be  belittled,  Gregory  took  with 
him  to  the  scene  of  operations,  full  legal  authority 
to  order  a  halt  upon  the  work  that  Randall  was 
rushing  forward.  He  had  only  to  have  his  papers 
duly  served,  to  render  Randall  an  outlaw  if  he 
should  refuse  to  obey  their  mandates. 

But  it  was  one  thing  to  have  the  influence  to  ob- 
tain the  papers,  and  quite  another  thing  to  serve 
them  properly,  and  to  enforce  them,  after  they 
were  served,  as  we  shall  see. 

That  is  why  this  chapter  began  with  the  word 
Midnight. 


238  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"or  it  was  midnight  between  two  certain  dates, 
when  Gregory  and  Wadleigh,  at  one  end  of  the 
pass,  and  Taggart  and  Cuthbert  and  Crosby  at  the 
other  end,  set  out  with  their  followers  at  their 
heels  to  serve  the  original  papers  on  the  one  hand, 
or  certified  copies  of  the  same  on  the  other. 

They  had  figured  it  out  that  Randall  could  have 
no  warning  of  what  was  coming. 

They  reasoned  that  the  man  who  was  building 
the  Cut-off  that  was  to  bankrupt  one  railroad  and 
bring  another  one  figuratively  to  its  knees,  would 
be  taken  unawares,  and  would  not  hesitate  to  show 
himself,  as  he  had  done  inevitably,  when  called 
upon.  Neither  of  the  leaders  doubted  that  the 
papers  would  be  served  on  Randall  at  one  end  of 
the  pass  or  the  other,  that  night. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  Dan  had  ridden  into  Magi- 
cian that  very  morning  exactly  as  he  had  done 
many  times  since  the  beginning  of  his  operations 
in  the  pass,  and  they  believed  that  they  would 
find  him  as  unprepared  for  their  coming  as  they 
had  anticipated  and  hoped. 

Dan,  however,  had  sources  of  information  at  his 
command  which  they  did  not  suspect.  He  was  al- 
ways an  apostle  of  preparedness. 

Midnight,  therefore,  of  that  particular  date, 
found  Dan  Randall  seated  inside  of  a  shanty  that 
he  had  erected  for  his  own  use  at  the  Devil's  Pul- 
pit. The  interior  of  that  room  closely  resembled, 
to  the  educated  eye,  the  office  of  a  train  dispatcher 
and  a  telephone  exchange  combined. 

Telegraph  and  telephone  wires  ran  into  it  from 
both  directions.  Keys  and  sounders,  and  relays, 
clicked  noisily  upon  the  big  square  table,  and  there 


THE  VOICES  OVER  THE  WIRE       239 

was  an  operator  beside  each  sounder,  and  a  man 
with  a  head-piece  receiver  fast  to  his  ears  at  each 
of  the  telephones;  and  all  of  them  seemed  to  be 
writing  all  the  time,  furiously,  as  if  their  lives  de- 
pended upon  what  they  were  doing. 

At  the  desk  where  Randall  was  seated,  a  dicta- 
graph stood  close  by,  so  that  it  would  speak  di- 
rectly into  his  ear  when  the  switch  was  thrown  in 
upon  it. 

Did  you  ever  hear  a  dictagraph  speak  into  a 
room?  It  is  like  a  man  talking,  voice  and  all.  It 
is  astounding  and  uncanny,  but  very  real. 

Both  hands  of  the  clock  against  the  wall  pointed 
at  exactly  midnight  when  one  of  the  telephone  op- 
erators threw  in  the  dictagraph  switch,  and  Bux- 
ton's  voice  from  the  western  end  of  the  pass, 
sounded  in  that  shanty  room  as  plainly  as  if  he 
had  been  present  in  person. 

"Taggart  and  his  men  are  coming,'*  he  said. 
4 'They  are  now  more  than  half  way  here  fromi 
Bluer ock  station.  Any  orders?" 

"Keep  them  out,  that's  all,"  Dan  replied. 
"Keep  them  out,  no  matter  how  you  do  it." 

Then,  after  a  moment  another  voice  spoke  into 
the  room,  quietly,  and  to  the  point.  This  one  from 
the  eastern  end. 

"Wadleigh  and  his  bunch  are  coming,"  it  said. 
"They're  about  half  way  between  here  and  Ma- 
gician. Should  be  here  in  fifteen  minutes.  Any 
orders,  chief?" 

1  'Yes.  Keep  them  out  at  any  cost.  I'm  coming 
right  down  to  you." 

Two  minutes  later  he  started  for  the  Magician 
end  of  the  pass. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

First  Blood 

A  hundred  yards  from  the  eastern  end  of  the 
pass  the  two  hundred  and  more  men  who  were  led 
by  Ace  Wadleigh  and  old  Lionel  Gregory,  came  to 
a  halt. 

Three  of  their  men  who  had  been  sent  on  in  ad- 
vance, as  scouts,  returned,  and  that  same  Thibault 
who  had  met  with  such  summary  punishment  at 
the  hands  of  Mike  Reardon,  at  Lonccamp,  re- 
ported. 

"They're  ready  for  us,  Mr.  Wadleigh,"  he  said, 
with  a  grim  smile.  "There  ain't  no  such  thing  as 
gittin'  past  that  fort  of  theirs,  tonight,  unless 
they're  willin'  to  let  us  do  it.  Not  nohow." 

Gregory  came  up  beside  Wadleigh.  Thibault 
faced  them.  Behind  him  were  the  two  remaining 
scouts. 

"What's  the  matter?"  Gregory  demanded, 
querulously.  "Why  don't  we  go  ahead?  What 
are  we  waiting  here  for?  Who  gave  the  order  to 
halt?" 

"I  did,"  Wadleigh  replied,  sharply.  "I  told 
you  that  Randall  would  be  prepared  for  us,  Mr. 
Gregory,"  Wadleigh  replied. 

"Well,  he  dare  not  keep  us  out  of  the  pass.  It's 


FIRST  BLOOD  241 

a  public  highway  over  the  mountain.  Besides, 
I've  got  the  papers " 

"But  you  haven't  served  the  papers— yet," 
Wadleigh  interrupted,  with  a  slow  smile. 

"That's  precisely  what  we're  here  for— to  serve 
them,  isn't  it?" 

"Yes;  but  first  we  must  find  somebody  to  serve 
them  on.  And  that  particular  'somebody'  hap- 
pens to  be  Randall,  himself.  Mr.  Gregory,  the 
plain  fact  is  that  we've  got  to  fight  our  way  to  hint 
before  we  can  serve  them.  He  isn't  likely,  now,  to 
step  out  here  in  front  of  us,  and  show  himself.  It 
seems  pretty  certain  that  we  can't  get  to  him  to- 
night. We'll  have  to  wait  till  morning  to  do 
that." 

"Why?" 

"Ask  Thibault.    He  will  tell  you." 

The  old  man  faced  about. 

"What's  the  matter,  Thibault?"  he  demanded. 
"What 'sin  the  way?" 

"It's  a  regular  fort,  sir,"  Thibault  replied. 
"They  have  built  it  straight  across  the  end  of  the 
pass,  where  it  begins  to  narrer.  That's  what." 

"What  kind  of  a  fort?  It  isn't  anything  that 
we  can't  get  past,  is  it?" 

"I  reckon  it  is,  sir— anyhow,  between  now  an' 
daylight." 

"We've  got  almost  three  hundred  and  fifty  men 
here  with  us,  and  every  one  of  them  has  my  per- 
sonal promise  of  extra  pay  if  they  have  to  do  any 
fighting.  Most  of  them  would  rather  fight  than 
not.  We  can  knock  that  fort,  as  you  call  it,  to 
smithereens,  can't  we,  Thibault?  You've  got 
some  dynamite  with  you,  haven't  you?" 


242  UP  AGAINST  IT 

'  JJure  I  have,  Mr.  Gregory,  an'  plenty  of  it,  at 
that.  But,  all  the  same " 

"Well,  use  it;  and  use  plenty  of  it,  too." 

Thibault  turned  his  eyes  upon  Wadleigh  as  he 
replied: 

"All  right,  sir.  I'll  do  it— if  that's  the  orders." 

He  made  as  if  to  turn  away,  but  Wadleigh 
stopped  him. 

' 'Wait,  Thibault,' '  he  said.  "Tell  us  just  what 
sort  of  a  fort  it  is,  and  exactly  what  you  think  you 
are  up  against." 

A  group  of  two  score  or  more  of  the  foremen, 
bosses,  bullies,  and  head  fighting  men  of  the  at- 
tacking party,  had  come  forward  and  gathered 
around  them,  and  they  pressed  forward  eagerly  to 
hear  what  Thibault  might  have  to  say. 

"It's  the  kind  that  ain't  easy  to  git  past,"  Thi- 
bault replied.  "It's  a  double  string  of  logs,  head 
high  an'  more,  laid  one  on  top  of  another,  an'  filled 
in  with  dirt  an'  rocks  an'  things,  between  'em,  all 
the  way  across.  An'  what's  more " 

"It  won't  stand  up  against  dynamite,  will  it?" 
Gregory  burst  in,  impatiently. 

"Not  if  you  can  git  the  dynamite  to  it,  it 
won't,"  was  Thibault 's  reply. 

"Well,  it's  your  business  to  get  the  dynamite  to 
it,  isn't  it?" 

"Let  Thibault  finish  with  what  he  was  telling, 
Mr.  Gregory,"  Wadleigh  suggested,  and  nodded 
to  the  man  to  continue. 

"They've  put  up  three  strings  of  seven-foot 
barbed- wire  fence  outside  of  the  fort  itself,  sir," 
Thibault  informed  them.  "An'  between  them, 
they  have  zigzagged  a  lot  more  of  the  barbed  wire. 


FIRST  BLOOD  243 

An'  then,  just  now,  when  me  an'  the  other  two  of 
us  crept  up  toward  it,  they  sung  out  to  us  to  keep 
our  hands  off .  That ' s  all. " 

"And  you  kept  them  off,  eh?  You're  a  fine  lot, 
you  are." 

"Mebby,  sir,  you'd  like  to  go  out  there  yourself 
an'  try  to  put  a  pair  o'  nippers  onto  them  wires,'* 
Thibault  said,  grimly.  "It  might  do  for  you,  but 
it  wouldn't  be  healthy  f'r  me.  Not  this  evenin'." 

One  of  the  fighting  bullies  who  had  kept  him- 
self in  the  background  until  then  pushed  forward. 

1  'Aw,  come  on! "  he  exclaimed.  "What's  eatin' 
you,  Thibault?  Let's  rush  'em." 

Others,  who  had  crowded  up  after  him,  took  up 
his  cry. 

"That's  the  talk!"  somebody  yelled. 

"Come  on,  boys,"  another  man  shouted. 

It  was  an  unruly  crowd. 

The  men  who  comprised  it  had  gone  there  with 
the  expectation  of  some  sort  of  a  scrap,  and  they 
did  not  care  to  be  denied  merely  because  of  the 
physical  cowardice  of  one  or  two.  They  had  gone 
there  to  commence  work,  at  good  pay,  and  they 
were  ready  to  begin. 

A  murmur  arose  among  them.  They  pushed 
forward,  and  the  murmur  grew  into  hoarse  shout- 
ings. They  crowded  past  their  leaders,  and  be- 
gan to  move  forward,  at  first  slowly,  then  with 
more  haste  which  finally  increased  to  a  run.  They 
were  charging  upon  the  barricade  that  Thibault 
had  only  partly  described. 

Gregory  was  pleased  by  the  demonstration,  and 
did  not  seek  to  hide  the  fact  that  he  was  so.  He 
encouraged  them  with  nods  of  his  head,  and  a  thin 


244  UP  AGAINST  IT 

smile  upon  his  thinner  lips.  His  voice  could  not 
be  heard,  there  were  so  many  others  to  drown  it 
out. 

Ace  Wadleigh  stepped  to  one  side  with  a  shrug 
of  his  shoulders,  and  one  of  his  slow,  enigmatical 
smiles  upon  his  face.  He  was  satisfied,  too,  for  he 
knew  that  it  must  come  to  a  down-and-out  fight  in 
time,  and  he  was  quite  willing  that  it  should  begin 
without  delay. 

Wadleigh  knew  the  character  of  the  men  whom 
Gregory  had  engaged,  and  he  knew  also  that  they 
would  not  fight  at  their  best  unless  they  were  first 
thoroughly  enraged.  A  little  scrap  now,  and  a 
few  of  them  hurt,  or  killed,  would  do  that. 

Thibault  drew  aside  with  him,  shrugging,  also. 
He  had  no  taste  for  what  was  coming. 

Like  a  rioting  horde  the  mob  rushed  forward 
past  their  leaders,  yelling  as  they  went,  and  they 
approached  to  a  point  within  a  few  yards  of  the 
outermost  stretch  of  barbed  wire  before  there  was 
a  sound  from  beyond  the  fort. 

There  they  halted,  dismayed.  Their  line 
swayed  for  a  moment,  and  then  was  still. 

Out  of  the  darkness,  directly  in  front  of  them, 
flashed  a  triple  row  of  electric  lights  which  threw 
into  brilliant  illumination  the  entire  surrounding 
scenery,  rendering  everything  as  plainly  visible  as 
if  it  were  midday,  and  at  the  same  instant  a  single 
volley  of  rifle  shots  from  the  top  of  the  barri- 
cade, bore  to  the  attacking  party  a  warning 
which  brought  every  man  among  them  to  a  stand- 
still. 

Not  that  a  bullet  was  aimed  at  them.  Not 
that  a  man  was  wounded  or  injured  in  any  way. 


FIRST  BLOOD  245 

The  projectiles  had  sped  harmlessly  over  their 
heads. 

But  the  sound  of  that  volley  was  sharp,  emi- 
phatic,  and  filled  with  menace  of  what  might  fol- 
low it  if  it  were  unheeded. 

The  line  halted,  wavered,  stood  still  and  waited. 

Directly  in  front  of  it,  extending  across  the  en- 
tire width  of  the  rock-bound  entrance  to  the  pass, 
stretched  the  first  barrier  of  barbed  wire;  and  be- 
yond that  were  others,  as  Thibault  had  described 
them. 

Truly,  the  men  who  held  the  pass  against  them 
were  prepared. 

Lionel  Gregory,  small,  weazened,  thin-lipped, 
fox-eyed,  alert,  and  with  his  fighting  mettle  (tried 
and  proved  many  a  time  before  that  night,  in  other 
railroad  fights  that  he  had  encountered)  now  thor- 
oughly roused,  pushed  himself  forward  into  the 
open  space  between  his  men  and  the  barbed-wire 
barrier. 

He  stood  within  the  full  glow  of  the  many 
lights,  and  he  held  up  one  hand,  for  silence. 

"Who  is  it  that  dares  to  stop  us  at  the  entrance 
to  Magician  pass?"  he  called  out,  addressing  the 
barricade  of  logs,  and  those  who  were  hidden  be- 
hind it,  for  as  yet  not  one  of  Dan  Randall's  men 
had  shown  himself. 

There  was  no  answer. 

Not  a  human  voice  replied  to  him. 

Away  off,  from  somewhere  on  the  mountainside, 
the  howl  of  a  wolf  sounded  dismally.  It  was  the 
only  response  he  received. 

He  waited  a  moment,  then  wheeled  about  and 
faced  his  own  men. 


246  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Who  among  you  have  got  nippers  with  which 
to  cut  these  wires?"  he  demanded. 

A  dozen  pairs  of  them  were  thrust  forward 
toward  him  on  the  instant.  He  accepted  two  of 
them,  and  motioned  to  Wadleigh,  who  approached 
nearer  to  him. 

' '  Come, ' '  he  said.  ' '  Those  men  behind  that  fort 
will  not  dare  to  molest  us." 

"I'm  not  so  sure  about  that,"  Wadleigh  replied. 
"Still " 

"Are  you  afraid?" 

"No." 

"Come  on,  then.  We'll  take  this  length  of  the 
wire  fence,  between  these  two  posts.  You  take 
that  end  of  it ;  I  '11  take  this  one.  Are  you  ready? ' ' 
He  put  one  of  the  two  pairs  of  nippers  into  Wad- 
leigh's  hand.  "Come  on." 

"Wait  a  moment,"  said  Wadleigh. 

"Well?" 

"I  don't  think  that  they  will  permit  us  to  cut 
the  wires,  Gregory." 

"No?  Why  not?  What  will  they  do  to  stop 
us?" 

"You  heard  those  rifle  shots,  didn't  you?" 

"Yes.  Good  lord,  man,  you  don't  suppose  that 
they'll  dare  to  shoot  us,  do  you?" 

"I  do— if  you  ask  me. ' ' 

"Well,  I  don't.  If  you're  afraid,  Wad- 
leigh  " 

"I'm  not  afraid.    I'm  only  cautious." 

Without  further  objection  he  turned  away  and 
strode,  nippers  in  hand,  toward  the  other  end  of 
the  length  of  wire  between  the  two  posts.  And,  in 
the  meantime,  Lionel  Gregory  wheeled  around  in 


FIRST  BLOOD  247 

his  tracks  and  stretched  out  his  hand  toward  the 
topmost  wire,  with  the  nippers  opened,  and  ready 
to  bite  it  in  two. 

"Stop  that!"  The  sharp  command  came  from 
the  top  of  the  log  fort.  "Don't  touch  that  wire, 
Gregory." 

The  president  of  the  Pacific  &  Hudson  railroad 
company  halted  in  his  act,  with  the  nippers  almost 
touching  the  wire.  He  looked  toward  the  sound 
of  the  voice.  Wadleigh  paused,  and  looked,  also. 
Everybody  looked  in  that  direction. 

The  tall  figure  of  a  man  whom  nobody  recog- 
nized because  he  wore  a  handkerchief  tied  over 
his  face  so  that  it  effectually  concealed  his  fea- 
tures had  risen  from  behind  the  barricade,  and 
now  stood  with  leveled  rifle  in  his  grasp,  and  with 
the  muzzle  of  it  aimed  directly  at  Lionel  Gregory. 

"Drop  them  nippers!  Drop  'em,  I  say!"  came 
the  second  command. 

The  grasp  of  Gregory's  fingers  upon  the  offend- 
ing nippers  relaxed,  and  they  fell  to  the  ground. 
He  had  not  spent  the  best  part  of  his  years  in  the 
West  and  Northwest  for  nothing.  He  knew  when 
to  obey  a  command  of  that  sort;  he  understood  per- 
fectly well  just  what  it  might  mean  not  to  do  so. 

"Drop  yourn,  too,  Wadleigh.  You  won't  need 
'em,"  was  the  next  order;  and  Wadleigh  obeyed, 
as  Gregory  had  done.  "Now,  about  face,  both  of 
ye,  an'  march  back  to  where  ye  came  from.  This 
ain't  no  pink  tea  party  we're  holdin'." 

Again  the  two  men  obeyed  the  command. 

"Oh,  hell!"  a  voice  from  the  throng  of  men  be- 
hind Wadleigh  and  Gregory,  shouted.  "They 
wouldn't  shoot.  They  wouldn't  dast  do  it." 


248  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Then  came  jeers,  and  cat-calls,  and  lurid  curs- 
ings, from  among  the  men;  and  they  began  to 
grumble,  and  to  mill,  like  cattle  after  a  partial 
stampede. 

And  then  the  unexpected,  the  inevitable,  the 
unfortunate  thing,  happened. 

From  somewhere  in  that  crowd  that  had  fol- 
lowed Wadleigh  and  Gregory  from  Magician,  the 
sharp,  quick  bark  of  a  revolver  crashed  upon  the 
night  air,  and  the  solitary  figure  at  the  top  of  the 
log  fort  swayed  for  an  instant,  then  crumpled 
backward  into  the  obscurity  behind  it. 

The  first  blow  of  the  actual  fight  had  been 
struck.  The  first  blood  had  been  shed.  Perhaps 
the  first  life  had  been  taken. 

Even  Wadleigh  was  appalled  by  what  had  hap- 
pened. He  had  not  meant  that  the  first  shot 
should  come  from  his  own  side.  He  had  not  in- 
tended that  any  shot  should  be  fired  at  all  if  the 
pass  could  be  won  without  it. 

But  he  stood  his  ground,  there  under  the  light 
of  the  electrics,  although  he  fully  expected  that 
the  very  next  instant  would  bring  down  a  crash- 
ing volley  of  rifle  shots  from  behind  the  fort,  in 
which  he  might  be  the  very  first  one  to  fall. 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

The  Effect  of  the  Shot 

The  volley  did  not  come. 

A  silence  like  the  stillness  of  death  reigned 
along  that  mountainside  for  the  space  of  a  mo- 
ment or  two,  and  then  it  was  broken  by  the  distant 
howl  of  the  wolf  that  had  seemed  to  jeer  at  Greg- 
ory only  a  short  time  before. 

In  that  interval  Wadleigh  recovered  himself; 
so  also  did  Gregory.  Both  were  brave  men  in  the 
face  of  actual  danger.  Both  knew  that  the  danger 
was  very  real  just  then. 

They  turned  their  backs  toward  the  fort,  and  to 
the  guns  they  knew  must  be  leveled  at  them  at 
that  instant;  and  it  was  the  shrill,  piping  voice  of 
old  Lionel  Gregory  that  shouted  to  his  own  hire- 
lings: 

"Back!  Back,  I  say!  Every  one  of  you!  Fall 
back!  If  there  is  another  shot  fired  from  this  out- 
fit, I'll  see  that  the  man  who  does  it  HANGS  !" 

Perhaps  his  voice,  and  the  words  he  uttered, 
reached  to  those  men  who  were  hidden  behind  the 
fort.  Possibly  they  did  not.  At  all  events  there 
was  no  hail  of  bullets  from  beyond  the  barricade, 
and  the  men  outside  of  it  obeyed  the  command  of 
the  little  man  who  was  so  great  in  their  eyes,  in 
all  else  save  size. 


250  UP  AGAINST  IT 

They  fell  back,  gradually  at  first,  then  precipi- 
tately, and  they  kept  going  until  they  were  well 
beyond  the  rim  of  the  hills,  beyond  a  line  that 
might  have  been  drawn  between  the  two  points  of 
the  letter  Y,  which  formed  the  eastern  entrance  to 
the  pass. 

Gregory  followed  after  them. 

Wadleigh  stuck  close  to  his  side,  waiting.  For 
Ace  knew  how  to  wait,  and  when  to  wait.  He 
much  preferred  to  play  second  fiddle  just  then.  It 
would  be  time  enough  for  him  to  lead— afterward. 

And  he  meant  to  lead,  finally.  He  had  intended 
that  from  the  beginning.  Now,  more  than  ever, 
he  was  determined  to  do  so. 

Behind  them  the  electric  lights  that  had  illumi- 
nated fort  and  wire  fences,  went  out.  Night 
reigned  again  where,  but  a  moment  before,  all  had 
been  as  light  as  day. 

Not  a  sound,  not  a  protest  of  any  sort,  had  come 
from  the  force  that  guarded  the  entrance  to  the 
pass.  The  men  behind  the  piled-up  logs  might  as 
well  have  been  dead,  so  far  as  any  manifested  evi- 
dence of  their  being  alive  was  concerned. 

Nevertheless,  those  men  were  very  much  alive, 
and  it  was  no  lack  of  fighting  spirit  that  kept  them 
quiet.  Far  from  it. 

It  was  the  presence  of  their  leader,  on  the  spot, 
at  the  crucial  moment,  that  held  them,  and  that 
continued  to  hold  them  when  every  one,  had  he 
followed  his  own  individual  impulse,  would  have 
retaliated  in  kind.  The  comparatively  peaceful 
scene  might  have  resolved  itself  into  a  veritable 
slaughter. 

Dan  Randall  had  started  down  the  pass  from 


THE  EFFECT  OF  THE  SHOT    251 

the  pulpit,  at  once,  after  the  receipt  of  the  tele- 
phone message  which  had  warned  him  of  the  ap- 
proach of  the  Wadleigh  and  Gregory  forces.  He 
had  waited  only  just  long  enough  to  speak  again 
to  Buxton,  at  the  western  end. 

"Our  information  is,  in  effect,  that  Taggart  will 
fight  his  way  inside,  with  powder,  if  he  can't  get  in 
without  it,"  he  said.  "But  I  know  that  you  can 
take  care  of  your  end,  Bux.  I  must  go  down  to  the 
east  end.  Ace  and  old  Lionel  are  coming.  I  am 
giving  you  only  these  directions:  Keep  Taggart 
out.  Don't  let  him  inside.  That  is  all." 

His  rugged  little  mountain  horse  took  him 
swiftly  over  the  course,  for  the  electric  lighting 
used  for  the  night  shifts  made  the  pass  almost  as 
light  as  day.  Still,  by  doing  the  best  he  could, 
he  arrived  behind  the  logs  of  the  fort  only  just  in 
time  to  hear  that  pistol  shot,  and  to  catch  in  his 
arms  the  man  who  was  the  victim  of  it. 

He  saw,  too,  what  the  others  of  his  men  could 
not  see  and  had  not  seen,  and  that  was  that  Mike 
Reardon— for  it  was  he— was  not  killed;  had  not 
been  even  seriously  wounded. 

In  fact,  Mike  was  not  so  much  as  stunned. 

The  bullet  had  grazed  the  side  of  his  head,  un- 
balanced him,  and  knocked  him  from  his  perch  on 
the  topmost  log,  that  was  all;  and  he  shook  him- 
self out  of  Randall's  grasp  almost  as  soon  as  the 
latter  seized  upon  him. 

"Keep  the  men  still,  Mike,"  Randall  ordered, 
with  rare  presence  of  mind.  "Quick.  Tell  them 
that  you're  all  right." 

Reardon  did  so. 

He  stood  upon  his  feet,  and  waved  his  arms  at 


252  UP  AGAINST  IT 

the  men  who  were  on  the  point  of  rushing  forward 
to  pour  a  storm  of  bullets  upon  those  outside. 

"Niwer  touched  me!"  he  called  at  them. 
"Wait.  Faith,  I  done  that  to  make  'em  think 
they'd  kilt  me.  See?" 

They  stopped.  They  waited.  They  chuckled. 
They  laughed  aloud  with  suppressed  sounds  of 
their  mirth.  Reardon  turned  and  grinned  at  Ran- 
dall. 

"Sure,  'twas  a  smarrrt  rap  alongside  av  th'  head 
that  I  got  for  it,  all  the  same,  chief,"  he  said.  "It 
felt  more  like  a  wallop  from  Ben  Taggart's  fist, 
than  anything  else,  so  it  did." 

Randall  sprang  toward  one  of  the  peep-holes  be- 
tween the  logs,  and  peered  outside. 

"They  are  falling  back,"  he  said.  "Order  the 
lights  switched  off.  We  won't  need  them,  now." 

"Then  there  won't  be  anny  more  fightin'  this 
night,  I'm  thinkin',"  Reardon  replied  as  he  turned 
and  waved  one  of  his  hands  to  convey  the  neces- 
sary order. 

"No.  I  hardly  think  so.  Judging  from  their 
actions,  they're  frightened  at  what  has  happened." 

"What  about  the  mornin',  do  you  think?" 

"There  will  be  something  doing  then,  I  suppose. 
Heaven  knows  what." 

"Harrrk  a  minute,  Mr.  Randall." 
,  "Well?" 

"Can't  ye  hear  them  drills  a  singin',  up  there  in 
the  pass?" 

"Surely." 

"Don't  ye  think  that  ole  Lyin'  Gregory  can  hear 
'em,  too?" 

"Yes.    I  think  so." 


THE  EFFECT  OF  THE  SHOT    253 

"Then  him,  an'  that  snake  Wadleigh  ought  to 
know  that  we're  keepin'  busy;  eh?" 

"Of  course.  They  know,  now,  that  I  have  got 
the  pass,  and  that  I  mean  to  hold  it.  They  know, 
since  they  saw  those  lights,  that  I  have  dynamos 
and  wires,  and  arcs,  and  incandescents  in  plenty, 
and  that  we  are  running  night  shifts." 

"An'  all  that  means,  don't  it,  that  they  know, 
too,  if  they  don't  get  inside  here  before  they're 
much  older  they  might  as  well  stay  out  altogether? 
Hey?" 

"You  bet  your  life  they  do,  Mike." 

"Faith,  thin,  they'll  be  afther  gittin'  inside  to- 
morrer— if  they  can  do  it." 

"Very  likely." 

"What's  doin'  over  at  th'  other  end  of  the  pass? 
D'ye  know  that?" 

"Taggart  is  there  with  about  two  hundred,  or 
more,  of  his  followers." 

"Aye;  an'  they're  a  bad  lot.  I  know  the  kind 
he'd  pick.  Mebby  Mr.  Buxton  is  afther  havin'  a 
bad  time  of  it,  by  now,  chief. ' ' 

"All  the  same,  they  won't  get  past  Buxton," 
Randall  replied,  with  confidence. 

"Mebby  not.  I  don't  think  they  will,  either. 
But  there'll  be  some  dead  min  over  there,  by  now, 
or  I  don't  know  Ben  Taggart's  ways— an'  I  think 
I  do." 

"Wait,  Mike.  I'll  go  to  the  telephone,  and  find 
out  what  is  happening." 

1  'What's  the  use,  sir?  Let  'em  alone.  Mr.  Bux- 
ton'11  report  whin  it's  over,  an'  what  you  don't 
know  about  it  in  the  meantime  won't  hurrrrt  ye. 
Hark,  now.  What's  that?" 


254  UP  AGAINST  IT 

A  shout,  and  then  a  second  one,  came  to  them 
from  outside  the  barricade. 

"They  be  lookin'  for  a  parley- voo,  I  reckon," 
Reardon  said,  with  a  grin.  Apparently  he  had 
forgotten  all  about  the  blow  of  the  bullet  upon  the 
side  of  his  head.  But  he  was  accustomed  to  hard 
knocks  and  minded  them  not  at  all— unless  they 
deprived  him  of  the  power  to  use  his  great 
muscles.  "What  are  ye  goin'  to  do  about  it, 
chief?" 

"Nothing,"  calmly. 

"Eh?    Not  a  dommed  thing?" 

"Nothing  at  all.  I'm  not  going  to  hear  them. 
Pass  the  word  along,  Mike.  I  don't  want  a  sound 
to  go  out  from  here.  Not  one,  except  the  rattle  of 
the  drills,  up  in  the  pass.  They're  welcome  to  that 
sound." 

"Begorra,  that's  good.  Sure,  that's  a  peach  av 
an  idee.  Nothin',  says  you.  Nothin',  says  I. 
Nothin',  says  the  bunch  av  us.  Trate  'em  wid  con- 
tempt, says  you.  Let  'em  think  we're  asleep,  says 
I.  Faith,  that's  bully."  Then,  to  the  men  who 
had  drawn  near,  he  added:  "Not  a  sound  out  of 
ye,  men.  We'll  give  'em  all  they're  wantin', 
afther  breakfast." 

Again  the  voice  came  to  them  from  the  darkness 
outside  the  fort,  and  this  time  Randall  recognized 
it.  Ace  Wadleigh  was  there,  in  person. 

"Hello,  there,  inside  the  fort!"  he  called. 

Then  he  waited,  and,  after  a  time,  repeated  his 
summons  once  more. 

"Begorra,  that'll  puzzle  the  head  off'n  him,  so 
it  will,"  Reardon  chuckled.  "Mebby  he'll  be 
afther  thinkin'  that  the  bullet  he  shot  at  us  killed 


THE  EFFECT  OF  THE  SHOT    255 

the  hull  outfit;  eh?  Sure,  he's  sayin'  something 
now.  Listen." 

,  "If  you  are  there,  Randall— and  we  are  sure 
that  you  are— you  had  best  answer  my  hail," 
Wadleigh  called  at  the  top  of  his  voice,  and  then 
waited  once  again. 

"Then  listen  to  me,"  he  called  again,  at  last. 
"Mr.  Lionel  Gregory,  president  of  the  Pacific  and 
Hudson  Bay  Railroad  Company,  is  here  with  me. 
He  is  standing  beside  me  now,  and  approves  of 
all  that  I  say.  Do  you  hear  me?" 
No  answer.  Wadleigh  went  on  yet  again: 
"I  have  made  proper  declarations,  and  filed 
them  with  the  authorities,  that  the  rights  of  way 
across  Magician  pass  belong  to  the  Manitoba  and 
Juneau  Railroad  Company,  of  which  I  am  now  the 
president,  and  that  they  have  been  destroyed  by 
fire.  Also,  by  the  authority  of  the  board  of  direc- 
tors of  my  company,  vested  in  me  at  our  last  meet- 
ing, I  have  agreed,  under  certain  conditions,  to 
transfer  all  of  those  rights  to  Mr.  Lionel  Gregory, 
and  others.  Together,  we  have  applied  to  the 
proper  authorities  to  have  you  and  your  followers 
restrained  from  taking  possession  of  Magician 
pass,  and  we  have  with  us  the  regularly  drawn 
and  attested  official  papers,  so  commanding  and 
restraining  you.  I  shall,  now,  personally,  force 
my  way  past  these  barbed-wire  tangles,  and  at- 
tach the  said  papers  to  the  logs  of  the  barricade 
behind  which  you  are  concealed;  which  act,  I  am 
instructed,  will  constitute  a  sufficient  service, 
which,  in  its  turn,  if  disobeyed,  will  render  you, 
and  each  of  your  followers,  collectively  and  indi- 
vidually, OUTLAWS.  Do  you  hear  me,  now?" 


256  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Sssshhh!  Don't  answer,"  said  Randall,  seiz- 
ing Mike  Reardon's  arm  as  the  latter  moved  as  if 
he  were  about  to  reply. 

"Faith,  I'd  like  to  push  his  face  in  for  him,  so 
I  would,  chief.  Brandin'  me  an  outlaw,  indade!" 

' '  Keep  still.    He  isn't  through,  yet. ' ' 

Nor  was  he.  After  a  short  pause,  Wadleigh 
continued: 

"In  the  morning,  as  soon  as  it  is  light,  if  you 
have  not  taken  heed  of  the  authority  of  this  Do- 
minion, as  expressed  in  the  aforesaid  papers,  we 
shall  storm  the  barricade  you  have  caused  to  be 
erected,  and  we  shall  take  possession  of  Magician 
pass  by  due  authority  of  law,  using  sufficient  force 
to  do  so,  if  found  necessary.  I  shall  now  affix  the 
aforesaid  papers  as  I  have  stated." 

"Sure  he's  long-winded  enough  about  it," 
grumbled  Reardon.  "Do  you  think  he'll  do  it?" 

"Do  what?"  Randall  asked. 

"Crawl  up  here  in  the  dark  and  tack  thim 
papers  to  the  forrrt?" 

"I  think  he  is  quite  capable  of  attempting  it, 
Mike." 

"What  then?    Will  the  thing  worrrk?" 

"No.  We  don't  have  to  go  outside  to  get  the 
papers,  do  we?" 

"But,  ain't  he  the  wan  to  go  back  to  the  others 
an'  swear  that  you  stepped  outside  to  git  'em,  an' 
that  he  handed  thim  to  ye,  an'  that  ye  took  'em  all 
right?  Wouldn't  he  make  that  kind  of  an  affy- 
davit,  as  quick  as  he'd  slit  y'r  wizen  f 'r  ye,  if  y'r 
back  was  turned?" 

"He  might  do  that,  Mike.  I  had  not  thought 
of  that." 


THE  EFFECT  OF  THE  SHOT    257 

"Then,  begorra— SAY!  Thim  papers  ain't  of 
no  account  if  they  don't  git  to  you,  are  they?" 

"No." 

For  a  moment  after  that  Eeardon  was  silent, 
deep  in  thought  over  some  problem  that  had  oc- 
curred to  him.  Then,  with  a  wry  smile,  and  a  sly 
wink,  he  said: 

"Chief,  this  head  av  mine  is  hurtin'  like  blazes. 
Sure  I  plumb  forgot  it  until  this  very  minute. 
Will  ye  wait  here  till  I  come  back?  I  have  me 
doubts  about  that  spalpeen's  tryin'  that  dodge  he's 
been  talkin'  about.  I'll  be  back  in  a  jiffy." 

Dan  smiled,  not  at  all  deceived  by  Mike  Rear- 
don's  words  and  manner. 

"Go  ahead,  Mike,  if  you  want  to,"  he  said. 
"I'd  go,  myself,  only,  if  he  should  happen  to  be 
there  with  the  papers,  it  would  amount  to  a  serv- 
ice of  them.  But  don't  do  anything  that  you'll  be 
sorry  for  afterward." 

"Divil  a  fear  av  that,  chief,"  Reardon  replied 
as  he  went  swiftly  away.  "If  Ace  Wadleigh 
comes  inside  av  thim  wires,  to  serve  thim  papers, 
he  won't  have  anny  to  serve  by  the  time  he  gits 
here— an'  he  won't  be  goin'  back  again  to  make 
anny  affydavit  about  'em,  afterward,  either.  You 
hear  me." 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

The  Live  Wires 

Randall  watched  the  departing  figure  of  Rear- 
don  with  a  grim  sort  of  smile  in  his  eyes,  which  it 
was  too  dark  for  others  to  see,  for  the  boss  bully 
of  the.  hard-rock  men  had  not  deceived  his  chief  by 
that  subterfuge  about  a  pain  in  his  head.  He  knew 
very  well  indeed  that  Big  Mike  intended  only  to 
go  outside  of  the  fort,  and  to  capture,  if  he  could 
do  it,  Wadleigh,  or  anybody  else  who  might  dare 
to  approach  near  enough  to  the  log  barrier  to  tack 
papers  against  it. 

Dan,  however,  had  other  secrets  concerning  the 
defences  of  Magician  Pass  that  were  shared  only 
by  Buxton,  and  his  engineers.  They  were  parts 
of  his  general  system  of  preparedness  for  the 
building  of  the  Janver  Cut-off,  for  he  had  foreseen 
many  difficulties,  although  not  exactly  the  condi- 
tions by  which  he  was  then  confronted. 

He  had  not  purchased  his  dynamos,  and  his  wire, 
and  the  special  boilers  and  the  entire  electric  plant 
that  was  now  installed  in  the  pass,  without  inten- 
tion to  utilize  their  resources  for  offence  and  de- 
fence in  case  of  attack.  There  are  other  things 
which  a  plant  like  that  one  can  dp  than  merely  to 
supply  power  and  light  for  carrying  on  the  work. 
He  had  known  before  he  made  his  purchase  almost 


THE  LIVE  WIRES  259 

a  year  before,  that  physical  protection  inside  the 
walls  of  Magician  pass  was  quite  likely  to  be 
vastly  important  before  the  work  was  finished. 
Only,  then,  he  had  reckoned  solely  upon  the  ani- 
mosity and  venom  of  Lionel  Gregory.  It  was 
God's  mercy  that  he  had  not  revealed  all  of  these 
plans  to  Ace  Wadleigh. 

Gregory  and  the  other  "big  fellows"  he  had 
realized  from  the  start,  would  fight  him— and  he 
had  known  that  they  would  fight  to  a  finish  and 
without  mercy,  as  soon  as  they  realized  that  he  in- 
tended to  build  the  Cut-off  at  all  hazards.  They 
would  not  hesitate  to  drive  him  out  of  the  pass 
with  bullets  and  dynamite,  if  there  were  no  other 
means  of  accomplishing  it.  And  so,  he  had  de- 
termined not  only  to  get  into  the  pass,  but  to  stay 
in  it  after  he  got  there. 

No  sooner  was  Mike  Reardon's  back  well 
turned  than  he  made  his  own  way  hastily  through 
the  inclosure,  and  a  few  rods  up  the  pass  itself,  to 
what  he  called  the  East  Station,  which  was  merely 
a  small  building  of  logs  to  inclose  an  office,  the 
telephone,  and  an  electric  switchboard. 

Dan  was  wondering,  as  he  went  onward,  if  Ace 
Wadleigh  would  indeed  have  the  hardihood  to  at- 
tempt in  person  to  nail  the  summonses,  or  the  in- 
junctions, or  whatever  the  legal  papers  were,  to 
the  fort. 

He  hoped  so.  He  hoped  that  it  might  be  Wad- 
leigh. And  he  had  his  own  reasons  for  indulging 
that  hope. 

There  were  two  young  men  in  charge  of  the 
Station.  They  belonged  in  Magician,  and  had 
been  selected  for  their  present  occupation,  by  Bux- 


260  UP  AGAINST  IT 

ton.  One  of  them  had  a  telephone  receiver 
clamped  fast  to  his  head;  the  other  was  seated 
within  reach  of  the  several  telegraph  keys.  Both 
understood  the  manipulations  of  the  electric 
switchboard  which  was  within  their  reach. 

Dan  looked  at  his  watch  as  he  entered  the  sin- 
gle room  of  the  cabin. 

He  stopped  in  the  middle  of  the  floor  with  his 
eyes  fixed  upon  the  dial,  waiting,  apparently,  for 
an  estimated  interval  to  pass. 

Presently  he  returned  the  watch  to  his  pocket, 
and,  stepping  forward  quickly,  moved  the  switch 
that  was  marked  7  on  the  board.  Then  he  turned 
and  addressed  one  of  the  young  men. 

"Tom,"  he  said,  to  the  telegraph  operator,  "I 
will  take  your  wires  for  you  until  you  return.  I 
want  you  to  go  outside  for  me." 

"Yes,  sir,"  Tom  replied,  starting  to  his  feet. 

"Go  to  gate  2.  Step  outside,  and  close  it  after 
you.  Tell  the  guard  inside,  not  to  put  the  bar 
across  until  you  return." 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Wait,  just  outside  of  the  gate,  for  Rear  don. 
You  will  probably  hear  him  before  you  see  him. 
If  he  calls  out— do  you  know  his  voice?" 

"Everybody  knows  Big  Mike's  voice,  Mr.  Ran- 
dall." 

"If  he  calls  out,  blow  your  whistle.    You  have 
yours  with  you?" 
,     "Yes,  sir." 

"After  you  have  blown  it,  so  that  I  can  hear  it 
here,  mind  you,  call  to  Reardon.  Say  that"!  want 
him,  and  whatever  or  whoever  he  has  got  with  him. 
That's  all,  Tom.  Hurry." 


THE  LIVE  WIRES  261 

The  young  man  went  away  on  a  run.  Randall 
turned  to  his  companion. 

"Give  me  the  reports,  Philip,"  he  said;  then 
corrected  himself.  "But,  no.  I'll  attend  to  those 
later.  You  may  tell  me  if  there  is  any  news  from 
the  West  Station." 

"They  are  fighting  over  there,  sir." 

"Now?    Fighting  yet?" 

"Yes,  sir.  At  the  last  report  I  got,  over  the 
phone." 

"How  long  ago  was  that?" 

"Twenty  minutes,"  Philip  replied,  glancing 
toward  the  dollar  clock  that  hung  against  the  wall. 

"Anybody  hurt?" 

"Mr.  Buxton  got  a  bullet  through  his  hat  when 
he  got  on  top  of  the  fort  to  talk  to  Taggart.  That 
is  the  nearest.  Our  men  have  been  using  blanks, 
as  you  directed.  But  Taggart  has  found  that  out. 
The  last  report  was  that  Taggart  was  getting 
ready  to  rush  things." 

"All  right.  Tell  them,  over  there,  to  use  the 
switch,  if  they  have  not  done  so  already.  And 
then " 

He  stopped. 

The  shrill  blast  of  a  whistle  came  to  them.  Dan 
sprang  to  the  switchboard,  and  turned  back  No. 
7  to  its  former  position.  Then  he  stood  quite  still 
for  a  moment,  waiting.  Presently  he  strode  across 
the  floor  to  the  door  of  the  cabin  and  threw  it  open, 
and  in  the  dim  light  he  could  see  a  figure  running 
toward  him. 

In  a  moment  more  the  boy  called  Tom  arrived, 
breathlessly. 

"All  right,  Mr.  Randall,"  he  called  out,  as  soon 


262  UP  AGAINST  IT 

as  he  was  near  enough.  "Reardon  is  inside,  now, 
and  the  gate  is  barred.  He's  got  a  prisoner;  and' ' 
—young  Tom  grinned— ''big  Mike  is  fighting 
mad." 

While  Tom  was  talking  Randall  stepped  swiftly 
back  to  the  switchboard,  and  again  threw  in 
No.  7.  Then  he  passed  outside  without  another 
word. 

Near  the  middle  of  the  inclosure,  where  a  single 
incandescent  light  supplied  very  little  illumina- 
tion, he  could  see  Mike  Reardon  who  was  sur- 
rounded by  nearly  a  score  of  the  defenders  of  the 
fort. 

Mike  was  swearing  lustily,  and  picturesquely; 
but  all  the  time  he  was  holding  fast  to  a  man  he 
had  brought  inside  of  the  fort  with  him:  his  pris- 
oner. 

A  glance  sufficed  to  inform  Randall  that  the 
prisoner  was  not  Ace  Wadleigh,  and  he  was  con- 
scious of  a  vague  regret  that  he  was  no!.  Randall 
drew  backward  into  a  deeper  shadow,  and  called 
softly  to  a  man  who  was  passing. 

"Tell  Reardon  not  to  forget  his  duty  in  regard 
to  the  papers,  if  there  are  any,"  he  said,  and  the 
man  hurried  away  to  obey.  Then  Randall 
laughed,  softly,  for  he  could  hear,  quite  plainly, 
Big  Mike's  reception  of  the  instructions. 

"T'ell  wid  him  an'  his  orders,"  Mike  roared 
out.  "Faith,  it's  dead  I  am,  this  minute,  entirely. 
There's  a  million  volts  av  that  dommed  stuff  inside 
uh  me.  An',  look  at  HIM!"  He  pointed  toward 
his  prisoner  who  was  writhing  spasmodically  upon 
the  ground.  "Sure,  when  I  grabbed  him,  I  got  it, 
too.  The  chief  might-a  told  me." 


THE  LIVE  WIRES  263 

Randall  called  out  to  the  hard-rock  man: 

"I'll  be  inside  the  station,  Mike,  when  you're 
ready  to  come  to  me." 

"I'm  ready  now,  chief,"  the  big  fellow  shouted 
in  reply,  startled  because  his  not  too  respectful  re- 
marks had  been  overheard. 

"Come  along,  then,  and  bring  your  man." 

TEe  others  made  way  for  Reardon.  He  bent 
forward  and  jerked  the  prisoner  to  his  feet.  Then, 
with  force  that  was  anything  but  gentle,  but  which 
was  sufficiently  persuasive,  he  led  the  man,  unre- 
sistingly, to  the  cabin. 

"There  wa'n't  no  papers  on  him,  chief.  Not  a 
paper,'  Mike  said,  as  he  closed  the  door  behind 
himself. 

"That's  a  lie.  I  did  have "  The  prisoner 

got  only  that  far  in  what  he  wished  to  say  when 
the  flat  of  Big  Mike's  hand  fell  across  his  face,  and 
effectually  closed  his  mouth. 

"It's  him  that's  doin'  th'  lyin',  chief,"  Mike 
said  with  a  grin.  "Sure,  I  searched  him  through 
an'  through,  an'  there  wasn't  a  dommed  paper  on 
him.  .  .  .  Ain't  that  so,  ye  scum  of  the  earth? 

Tell  the  chief  it  is,  or  I'll "  he  raised  his  big 

fist  and  held  it  menacingly  over  the  prisoner's 
head. 

The  captive,  who  was  evidently  nothing  more 
than  a  "skinner"  by  occupation,  and  who  had 
doubtless  been  selected  for  the  work  of  tacking  the 
papers  against  the  fort  because  of  his  lack  of  im- 
portance, looked  first  at  the  threatening  fist,  then 
at  the  savage  visage  of  Big  Mike,  and  nodded. 

"Say  it,"  said  Mike.    "Don't  nod  it." 

"I  didn't  have  no  papers,"  the  man  replied. 


264  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Faith,  that's  all  we  want  of  you.  What  shall 
I  do  with  him,  chief?"  Mike  asked. 

"Send  him  up  the  pass.    Tomlinson  will  put 
him  to  work.    You're  a  skinner,  aren't  you,  my 
man?" 
,  "Yes,  sir." 

"You'll  get  double  pay,  here.  Do  you  want  to 
stay  and  go  to  work  on  the  morning  shift?" 

"Betcher  life  I  do,  sir." 

"Do  you  think  there  are  any  more  like  you,  out 
there,  who  would  wish  to  do  the  same  thing  if  they 
had  a  chance?" 

"More'n  half  of  them  would,  if  anybody  should 
ask  you,  sir.  There's  a  whole  bunch  of  them  that 
would  desert  and  come  to  you  in  a  minute,  if  they 
dared,  or  if  they  had  half  a  chance,"  was  the  quick 
and  eager  reply. 

"Very  good.  We  will  try  to  give  them  an  op- 
portunity. Take  him  away,  Mike.  Send  him  up 
to  Tomlinson." 

Reardon  reached  out  and  rested  his  hand  upon 
the  door.  Then  he  paused. 

"I  guess  you  heard  what  I  said  outside,  there, 
a  little  bit  ago,  chief,"  he  said,  half  sheepishly. 
'  'I  didn't  mean  it.  But  I  was  mad.  How  the  hell 
was  I  to  know  that  you  had  about  twenty  million 
volts  of  electricity  burnin'  up  them  wires  when  I 
grabbed  onto  this  gazabo,  who  couldn't  let  go  of 
the  wan  that  he  was  holdin'  onto?  Sure,  I  got  it 
me  ownself,  t 'rough  him,  an'  I  reckon  they  heard 
me  yell,  plumb  to  the  Great  Slave.  If  you'd-a  told 
me,  chief " 

"You  know  it  now.  That's  enough,  isn't  it?" 

"Mebby  it  is,  sir.    I  reckon  mebby  that's  what 


THE  LIVE  WIRES  265 

you  was  thinkin'  about,  when  you  didn't  seem  to 
care  even  if  Lyin'  Gregory  an'  his  bunch  did  try 
to  cut  them  wires,  under  cover  of  the  dark.  Sure, 
they  couldn't  cut  'em;  eh?" 

''They  might  cut  the  barbed  wire,  Mike.  That 
is  not  charged.  But  if  one  of  them  should  put  a 
.pair  of  steel  nippers  against  the  charged  wires- 
well,  those  wires  are  alive,  that's  all." 

"An'  it's  thinkin'  I  am,  that  the  wans  that 
touched  thim,  would  be  dead,  at  that." 

"Not  quite,  Mike.  But  they  would  be  uncom- 
fortable, to  say  the  least.  And  they  might  wish 
that  they  were  dead,  for  a  moment.  Go,  now.  I 
have  work  to  do,  here." 


CHAPTER  XXX 

War,  to  the  Utmost  Limit 

Twenty-one  days  had  come  and  gone  since  the 
night  when  Dan  Randall  sent  Jules  away  to  take 
the  trail  of  Lightfoot  for  the  recovery  of  the  little 
black  satchel.  AND,  to  find  out  what  had  become 
of  Joyce  Maitland.  .  .  .  And  not  one  word  nor 
message  of  any  sort  had  been  received  from  Jules 
in  all  that  time.  Not  one. 

Dan's  anxiety  had  been  very  great  indeed  al- 
though, outwardly,  he  had  given  no  sign  of  it. 

Every  minute  of  his  time  had  been  occupied  in 
the  bringing  in  of  his  supplies  and  materials,  in  the 
building  of  the  forts  at  the  ends  of  the  pass,  in  the 
installation  of  the  electric  system,  and  in  the  actual 
beginning  of  the  work  of  construction. 

He  had  slept  little,  and  that  only  at  intervals. 
Never,  regularly.  A  few  hours  out  of  the  twenty- 
four,  and  rarely  more  than  an  hour  or  two  at  a 
time,  had  been  his  utmost  limit,  and  the  strain  was 
beginning  to  tell  upon  him. 

He  had  grown  haggard  and  spare,  and  weary- 
eyed;  only,  the  keenness  of  his  eyes  had  not  dimin- 
ished, nor  had  his  wonderful  grasp  of  detail  and 
his  almost  superhuman  energy,  grown  less. 

He  was  everywhere  on  the  job  at  all  times  of 
the  day  or  night,  and  the  men  had  grown  to  look 
for  him  when  he  was  least  expected. 


WAR,  TO  THE  UTMOST  LIMIT        267 

He  had  established  a  system  of  premiums  by 
which  if  one  gang  outdid  another,  within  a  speci- 
fied time,  it  won  a  prize  worth  haying.  He  had 
extended  this  feature  even  to  individuals,  and  the 
consequence  of  it  all  was  that  never  within  the 
memory  of  any  one  of  the  workers  had  an  enter- 
prise gone  forward  with  half  the  speed  of  the  con- 
struction of  the  Janver  Cut-off. 

Nor  had  he  neglected  Yvonne,  at  the  stone  house 
near  White  Lake.  She  would  have  been  left  ut- 
terly alone  during  that  time,  but  for  old  Pitou, 
whom  Dan  induced  to  remain  with  her  until  the 
return  of  Jules.  But  now,  that  the  actual  pres- 
ence of  the  enemy  upon  the  ground  at  both  ends 
of  the  pass  made  it  certain  that  the  war  had  begun, 
Dan  realized  that  there  would  be  but  little  possi- 
bility of  his  going  out  of  the  pass  again,  until  the 
Cut-off  was  completed. 

The  funds  that  were  contained  within  the  little 
satchel,  he  had  not  needed— because  the  workers 
in  the  pass  preferred  not  to  be  paid  off  until  the 
job  was  finished;  and  then  they  would  want  all 
that  was  coming  to  them,  in  a  lump.  And  Dan  had 
dared,  with  bravery  superhuman,  to  go  ahead 
without  the  funds  to  pay.  His  great  faith  in  him- 
self, his  destiny,  and  in  the  future  of  the  Cut-off 
had  compelled  him  to  go  on. 

At  the  end  of  each  seven  days,  every  man  had 
received  a  due-bill  of  Dan's  indebtedness  to  him 
and  those  due-bills  would  have  to  be  met  and 
cashed,  in  time. 

Dan  knew  that  without  the  satchel  he  could  not 
supply  the  cash.  And  he  realized  that  unless  he 
had  the  cash  ready  to  pay  out,  when  the  time  came, 


268  UP  AGAINST  IT 

every  man  among  that  motley  crew  would  turn 
upon  and  rend  him,  and  all  his  works,  and  that  he 
would  stand  to  lose  the  Cut-off  at  the  very  last  mo- 
ment, even  after  he  had  completed  the  building  of 
it.  It  was  a  great  game  that  Dan  Randall  played; 
a  great  gamble. 

The  men  never  doubted  his  ability  to  pay.  They 
preferred  to  receive  no  cash  until  they  were 
through  with  the  job,  and  could  go  where  it  could 
be  spent.  Money  was  no  good  to  them  unless  there 
were  places  provided  to  spend  it.  Among  the 
supplies  stores  were  contained  all  things  that  any 
one  among  them  might  require— which  Dan  was 
willing  that  they  should  have.  Liquor  was  tab- 
booed. 

Thus,  the  recovery  of  the  satchel  and  its  con- 
tents, was  vital. 

There  were  other  resources  which  Dan  could 
command,  but  they  were  thousands  of  miles  dis- 
tant. The  situation  was  such  that  they  could  not 
be  drawn  upon  in  time  to  benefit  them. 

And  Joyce. 

But  for  Dan's  soul-abiding  conviction  and  faith 
that  she  was  safe  and  unharmed,  he  would  have 
thrown  the  Janver  Cut-off  and  all  that  it  meant  to 
him,  and  the  black  satchel  and  all  that  it  contained, 
to  the  eight  winds  of  Tophet;  to  Perdition. 

He  had  infinite  belief  in  that  unrecorded  sixth 
sense  of  his,  of  which  Joyce  Maitland  was  the 
mainspring.  He  had  complete  faith,  too,  in  Jules. 
That  faithful  servitor  would  have  been  amazed 
indeed  if  he  had  suspected  that  the  very  life,  and 
hope  of  success,  and  ambition  for  the  future  of 
M'sieu  rested  upon  his  shoulders. 


WAR,  TO  THE  UTMOST  LIMIT        269 

And  Jules  Legarde  had  variished. 

Randall's  means  of  getting  information  from 
the  outside  was  perfect.  It  was  accomplished  by 
putting  into  effect  one  of  the  amazing  plans  that 
had  been  perfected  in  his  mind,  almost  a  year  be- 
fore. The  telegraph  and  telephone  instruments 
installed  in  Magician  Pass,  explained  it. 

Secret  loops  had  been  run  into  the  pass  from 
telegraph  and  telephone  wires  that  approached 
the  mountain  from  every  side.  If  a  message  was 
sent  from  Magician  to  Janver,  or  to  Allerton,  or 
to  any  other  point  along  the  lines  of  the  railroads, 
the  loops  carried  that  message  into  the  little  house 
at  Devil's  Pulpit,  and  the  sounder  voiced  it,  and 
the  man  seated  at  the  table  wrote  it  down  in  the 
form  of  a  report  which  Dan  read  over  at  his  leis- 
ure. 

He  knew,  of  course,  that  sooner  or  later,  the 
loops  would  be  discovered,  and  destroyed;  but  un- 
til then  they  would  serve  him. 

And  so,  he  had  known  of  the  messages  between 
Wadleigh  and  Gregory,  and  Taggart,  and  others. 
Thus  he  had  been  kept  as  well  posted  concerning 
their  movements,  as  they  were  informed  them- 
selves. He  might  have  been  the  commander  of  an 
army,  or  the  arbiter  of  an  empire,  with  such  fa- 
cilities. 

He  had  hoped  against  hope  that  some  of  those 
wires  would  ultimately  provide  him  with  news  of 
Joyce,  and  of  Jules,  and  of  Lightfoot.  But  they 
did  not. 

All  that  he  did  learn  in  that  respect  was  nega- 
tive; but  such  as  it  was,  it  was  also  reassuring; 
It  was  merely  that  Taggart  and  Wadleigh  were  as 


270  UP  AGAINST  IT 

mystified  concerning  what  had  become  of  Light- 
foot  as  he  was;  also,  that  it  had  been  reported  to 
them  that  Joyce  Maitland  had  disappeared,  and 
was  supposed  to  have  been  lost  in  the  last  great 
storm  of  the  season. 

Dan  knew,  positively,  better  than  that.  So  he 
told  himself  over  and  over  again. 

The  place  under  the  ledge  where  Lightfoot  had 
taken  her  out  of  the  canyon,  and  where  Jules  had 
feared  that  both  might  have  been  buried  in  the 
sliding  snow,  contained  no  trace  of  either  of  them, 
for  Dan  had  lost  no  time  in  searching  it,  despite 
his  conviction  that  they  had  escaped.  His  heart 
told  him  that  she  had  escaped,  and  was  unharmed. 

Now,  after  three  weeks,  there  were  moments 
when  the  fears  of  Buxton,  as  expressed  by  him 
during  their  last  interview  on  the  subject,  re- 
turned to  Dan,  dismayingly. 

Lightfoot  was  a  scoundrel,  after  all.  Lightfoot 
was  an  Indian,  and  treacherous.  Lightfoot  was  a 
thief,  a  murderer,  and  all  that  was  bad;  and  now, 
because  of  his  escape  from  the  barracks  at  Magi- 
cian, he  was  an  outlaw.  Lightfoot  held  Joyce 
Maitland  in  his  power— a  prisoner— and  it  was 
likely  that  he  had  determined  not  to  return  at  all, 
even  to  Taggart,  knowing  that  he  must  face  im- 
prisonment if  he  did  so.  If  Lightfoot  had  pos- 
sessed himself  of  the  contents  of  the  satchel,  and 
held  Joyce  a  prisoner  in  his  power,  what  might 
not  he  dare  to  do? 

When  Mike  Reardon  departed  from  East  Sta- 
tion, Dan  read  over  the  reports  of  the  two  oper- 
ators, but  found  nothing  of  what  he  so  eagerly 
hoped  for.  Afterward  he  went  about  giving  his 


WAR,  TO  THE  UTMOST  LIMIT        271 

orders  for  the  morning.  Then  he  mounted  his 
horse  and  returned  to  the  pulpit. 

Up  there  the  sounders  were  clicking  merrily  as 
he  entered  the  cabin  that  held  them.  Buxton  ar- 
rived from  the  western  end  of  the  pass,  a  few  mo- 
ments later. 

"It's  all  over  for  the  present,  Dan,"  he  said. 
"I  gave  them  the  current.  I  had  to  give  them 
pretty  nearly  the  full  force  of  it  before  they  made 
up  their  minds  that  they  had  enough.  They  will 
try  dynamite,  now." 

' '  Of  course.    We  expected  that. ' ' 

"You  haven't  read  over  the  last  reports  yet, 
have  you?" 

"Not  since  I  left  the  eastern  end.    Why?" 

One  of  the  operators  passed  a  few  sheets  of 
paper  to  his  chief.  Dan  ran  them  over  carefully, 
then  raised  his  head  and  smiled  at  Buxton. 

"They're  mad,  aren't  they?"  he  chuckled. 

"Rather.  Never  mind  that.  Have  you  seen 
that  one  which  refers  to  Joyce?" 

"Yes.    I  have  it  here,  in  my  hand." 

"Taggart  thinks  that  she  is  here,  in  the  pass, 
with  us.  That's  what  he  tells  Wadleigh.  And 
that  we've  got  Lightfoot,  too.  Now,  Dan " 

"Wait,  Bux.  We  cannot  do  a  thing,  and  you 
know  that  we  cannot.  This  information  is  reas- 
suring, in  its  way,  because  it  tells  us  that  they* 
know  even  less  about  her  than  we  do." 

"But,  good  heaven,  man!  What  about  Light- 
foot?  Have  you  thought  of  him?  With  all  that 
money,  with  all  the  whiskey  he  wants,  with  Joyce 
as  his  helpless  prisoner?" 

"Yes,  Bux,  I  have  thought  of  all  of  it,"  Dan  re- 


272  UP  AGAINST  IT 

plied,  very  quietly.  "Also,  I  have  thought  of 
Jules.  I  am  trusting  to  Jules  Legarde." 

One  of  the  operators  turned  about  in  his  chair 
at  that  moment  and  passed  a  sheet  of  paper  that 
was  covered  with  writing  to  Randall.  Neither  he 
nor  Buxton  had  paid  any  attention  to  the  sound- 
ers on  the  table. 

Dan  took  the  intercepted  message  and  read  it 
rapidly.  Then,  as  if  controlling  himself  with  a 
great  effort,  he  passed  the  paper  in  silence  to  Bux- 
ton, and  leaned  back  against  the  wall  of  the  build- 
ing with  closed  eyes,  and  firmly  compressed  lips 
that  spoke  all  too  plainly  of  the  anguish  of  mind 
he  was  enduring. 

Buxton  read  the  message  that  had  just  come  in, 
aloud.  It  had  been  sent  by  Taggart  from  Blue- 
rock,  to  Wadleigh  at  Magician.  This  is  what  it 
said: 

"Jules  Legarde  just  captured  here.  Refuses  to 
talk,  but  I  will  make  him  talk  if  I  have  to  roast 
him.  He  came  from  toward  White  Lake.  I  have 
heard  of  a  hide-out  of  Randall's  over  that  way.  If 
Jules  won't  tell  where  it  is  I  will  find  it  anyhow. 
Must  be  something  there.  The  Maitland  girl, 
maybe.  Will  find  out.  Randall  has  charged 
wires  at  this  end,  to  keep  us  out.  In  the  morning 
I  shall  use  dynamite.  Advise  you  to  do  the  same 
at  your  end.  At  daylight  I  will  send  men  up  the 
mountain  on  both  sides  of  the  pass  to  blast  away 
every  cliff  and  ledge  where  a  shot  can  be  put  in. 
You  do  the  same.  We  can  fill  the  pass  full  of 
stones  if  we  use  enough  juice.  It  is  war  now,  and 
I  am  going  in  to  kill.  No  good  fooling.  Tell 
Gregory  to  go  back  to  Allerton,  and  to  forget  us, 


WAR,  TO  THE  UTMOST  LIMIT        273 

for  the  present.  We  will  need  him  and  his  influ- 
ence, later,  to  get  us  out  of  the  hole  we  dig.  I  am 
going  to  blow  that  pass  full  of  rocks,  or  blow  every 
man  that  is  in  there  out  of  it,  one  or  the  other,  or 
both.  Never  mind  the  fort.  Send  your  men  up 
along  the  top  of  the  path,  both  sides  of  it,  and  pile 
the  whole  line  of  it  full  of  exploding  dynamite. 
Blow*Randall  and  his  bunch  out  of  it,  or  bury  them 
in  it.  We  will  start  at  daylight.  When  will  you 
start?  Answer." 

The  answer  came  very  soon  after  that.  This  is 
what  it  was: 

"Taggart,  Bluerock:  Happened  to  be  here 
when  message  arrived.  Already  decided  Gregory 
go  to  Allerton.  He  will  protect  us  afterward. 
Your  plans  are  good.  Had  decided  upon  prac- 
tically same  thing  over  here.  Will  start  at  day- 
light, both  sides.  You  are  nearer  Pulpit.  Attack 
that  first.  Must  be  their  headquarters.  Jules  has 
a  secret  place  somewhere  near  White  Lake. 
Yvonne  must  be  there.  Get  her,  too.  Make  both 
talk  if  you  have  to  use  extreme  force  to  do  it. 
Keep  me  informed.  Make  the  Frenchman  tell 
what  was  in  that  satchel.  He  probably  got  to  it 
first.  It  is  war,  now,  with  no  quarter  asked  or 
given.  Go  the  limit.  Wadleigh." 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

The  Dynamite  Attack 

None  of  the  foregoing  events  had  been  permitted 
to  interfere  with  the  noisy  spatter  of  the  drills  at 
work,  the  occasional  roar  made  by  the  shooting  of 
a  blast,  the  shouting  of  the  teamsters,  or  the  sing- 
ing clang  of  rail  upon  rail  as  they  were  deposited 
length  by  length  along  the  line  of  the  proposed 
track. 

Dan  had  planned  from  the  beginning,  that  the 
work  of  building  the  Cut-off  should  continue,  as 
far  as  possible,  without  interruption.  He  doubted 
very  much  if  the  threatened  dynamite  attack 
would  stop  his  "boys"  in  what  they  were  doing. 
The  prizes  he  had  offered,  and  the  premiums  that 
had  already  been  won  and  lost  by  rival  groups  of 
workers  had  accomplished  much  in  pushing  for- 
ward the  work.  It  was  almost  phenomenal  in 
what  had  already  been  done. 

His  watch  told  him  that  there  would  yet  be 
somewhat  more  than  two  hours  of  darkness. 
Much  may  be  accomplished  in  two  hours  of  time. 
Have  you  ever  paused  to  consider  how  much  may 
really  be  done  in  one  minute? 

After  the  reading  of  the  two  messages  Dan  sat 
very  still  and  silent  for  a  time  while  his  compan- 
ions watched  and  waited. 


THE  DYNAMITE  ATTACK  275 

If  the  truth  be  told,  it  was  not  the  threatened  at- 
tack from  the  tops  of  the  surrounding  cliffs  that 
concerned  him  most;  it  was  the  peril  that  he  knew 
Jules  to  be  in  at  that  moment;  it  was  the  awful 
dangers  that  would  threaten  pretty  little  Yvonne 
when  the  brutal  Taggart  should  succeed  in  find- 
ing the  stone  house  at  White  Lake;  and  it  was 
more  than  all  else  his  serious  concern  for  Joyce, 
now  that  he  was  practically  certain  that  Jules  had 
returned  without  her.  Still,  the  intercepted  mes- 
sages reported  his  capture  as  having  occurred 
when  Jules  was  "coming  from  the  direction  of 
White  Lake." 

"Did  Jules  return  without  Joyce?"  Dan  asked 
himself.  "Is  it  not  more  likely  that  she  is  even 
now  in  the  stone  cottage  with  Yvonne?" 

Dan  was  ever  at  his  best  in  emergencies,  and 
when  the  first  stunning  effect  of  those  two  mes- 
sages between  Taggart  and  Wadleigh  had  passed, 
he  became  at  once  his  own  cool,  determined  self 
again. 

1  'We've  got  to  meet  those  dynamiters  more  than 
half  way,  Bux,"  he  exclaimed.  "Come  on." 

At  the  door  he  paused  and  turned. 

"Stick  to  your  posts,  boys,  no  matter  what  hap- 
pens," he  told  the  operators.  Then,  instead  of 
passing  outside,  he  stepped  back  into  the  room, 
and  added:  "Call  up  Rodgers,  Conroy,  Peters, 
Purcell,  Miron  and  Queed,  at  their  respective  sta- 
tions. Do  it  now.  Tell  them  that  we  are  com- 
ing—that /  am.  I  want  each  of  them  to  have 
their  hoisting  tackle  ready  for  use  by  the  time  I 
get  there.  I  want  every  man  that's  on  the  'off 
shifts'  awakened  and  pulled  out  and  in  readiness. 


276  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Have  the  hard-rockers  armed  with  dynamite.  We 
will  have  to  use  some  of  that.  Tell  the  teamsters 
to  take  their  whips.  No  guns.  No  firearms.  Go 
to  it,  now." 

Outside  the  house  he  stopped  again,  seizing  Bux- 
ton  by  the  arm. 

"Wait  a  moment,"  he  said.  "Bux,  I'm  going 
to  take  your  end  of  this  job.  I  want  you  to  take 
mine." 

"You're  the  boss,"  was  the  brief  response. 

"All  right.  There's  Rodgers,  getting  ready 
now.  He's  got  the  message.  See  that  his  men 
are  properly  equipped.  Pick  up  Conroy's,  and 
Peter's,  and  Purcell's  outfits,  as  you  go  along. 
Use  the  hoist  that  is  just  beyond  Purcell,  at  Sta- 
tion 8,  and  the  one  next  below  it,  at  Station  9. 
They  are  on  opposite  side  of  the  pass.  Do  you  get 
me,  Bux?" 

"I  know.    All  right.    I  understand." 

^t  will  take  an  hour  to  get  the  men  to  the  top, 
after  you  reach  the  stations." 

"All  of  that." 

"Let  Rodgers  take  charge  of  one  side  of  the 
pass;  you  keep  the  other." 

"That  is  precisely  what  I  thought  of  doing." 

"The  rest  of  the  directions  I  will  give  you,  are 
general." 

"Stop  Wadleigh  and  his  men,  on  both  sides  of 
the  pass.  That  is  all,  isn't  it?"  Buxton  asked. 

"Practically.  You  will  get  there  long  before 
he  does.  He  has  no  idea  that  we  are  informed  re- 
garding their  intentions.  We'll  throw  a  surprise 
into  them  that  will  last  them  the  rest  of  their 
lives." 


THE  DYNAMITE  ATTACK  277 

"We'll  put  the  fear  of  death  into  some  of  them, 
or  I'm  a  Dutchman.  But  give  me  an  idea  of  what 
I  am  to  do,  Dan." 

"You'll  have  to  be  governed  by  circumstances, 
Bux;  but  here  is  what  I  have  half  planned  to  do, 
myself,  down  the  west  end  of  the  canyon. 

"That  is  what  I  want  to  hear.'* 

"I'll  have  Miron  and  Queed  to  help  me;  two 
good  men.  Their  outfits  can  be  depended  upon 
to  do  good  work,  and  to  obey  orders,  too." 

"You're  right,  there." 

"We  will  get  to  the  top  of  the  cliffs  by  Miron's 
hoist,  and  at  Jules'  short-cut.  They're  at  oppo- 
site sides.  We'll  march  down  along  the  line  un- 
til it  begins  to  get  light— until  we  think  that  Tag- 
gart's  men  may  show  in  sight  at  any  moment. 
And  then  we  will  plant  a  string  of  mines.  Do  you 
get  me?  A  string  of  mines." 

"Yes,  Dan." 

"Not  too  heavy  ones,  Bux;  just  heavy  enough. 
Kot  too  close  to  the  cliffs,  but  far  enough  back 
from  the  pass  so  that  the  blasts  won't  disturb  the 
walls  of  the  canyon." 

"I  understand.    I  think  I  know  the  rest. ' ' 

"Wait.  One  string  of  mines  won't  do.  You'll 
need  three  or  four.  They  may  think  that  the  first 
one  is  a  bluff,  intended  to  frighten  them.  Touch  it 
off  before  they  get  close  enough  for  anybody  to 
get  hurt.  Send  the  whole  string  off  one  after  an- 
other—staccato, so  to  speak— a  second  or  two 
apart." 

"And  then ?" 

"If  they  come  on  again,  after  the  first  shots— 
and  if  Wadleigh  is  on  your  side  of  the  ravine,  they 


278  UP  AGAINST  IT 

will  do  that— let  them  get  a  little  closer  before  you 
set  off  the  second  string." 

"I  see.  And  if  they  keep  on  coming  after 
that?" 

"You  will  have  to  hurt  some  of  them  with  the 
third  one,  that's  all.  That  will  stop  them.  So 
long,  Bux.  Good  luck  to  you." 

"Just  one  word  more,  Dan," 

"Well?" 

"I  know  why  you  chose  my  end  of  the  pass  for 
this  work." 

"Of  course." 

"You  intend,  after  you  have  driven  Taggart's 
men  back,  to  go  to  the  stone  house  at  White  Lake. ' ' 

"Precisely,  Buxton." 

"Alone?" 

"I  don't  know.  That  will  depend  upon  cir- 
cumstances. But  I  think  so. ' ' 

"You've  got  something  else  besides  all  this  in 
your  mind,  haven't  you?" 

"Yes." 

"The  rescue  of  Jules  from  Taggart's  camp?" 

"Yes." 

"That  will  be  dangerous  work,  Dan." 

"Not  so  very.  But  that  is  why  I  thought  I 
might  do  it  better  alone." 

"I  was  thinking,  Dan " 

"Well?" 

"This:  That  we  might  take  a  big  force  of  our 
men  down  to  the  west  entrance,  open  the  gates  of 
my  fort,  make  a  rush  for  it,  and  take  Taggart's 
camp  by  force." 

"And  leave  anywhere  from  twenty  to  a  hundred 
dead  men  on  the  ground,  as  a  consequence?  No, 


THE  DYNAMITE  ATTACK  279 

Bux,  that  won't  do  at  all,  only  as  a  last  effort,  when 
everything  else  has  failed.  Go,  now.  There 
isn't  any  more  time  to  spare.  Don't  forget  one 
thing." 

"What  thing?" 

"If  they  should  capture  me— if,  for  any  reason 
at  all  I  should  not  be  able  to  get  back  here  to  you, 
you're  boss." 

Randall  hurried  away.  For  one  instant  Buxton 
stood  quite  still,  looking  after  him.  Then  he 
wheeled  about  and  started  as  hastily  in  the  op- 
posite direction. 

And  the  drills  still  tapped,  the  great  work  went 
onward.  Not  a  man  who  was  at  work  on  the  ac- 
tive shift  would  be  taken  off  for  this  adventure. 

Randall  found  Miron,  the  foreman  of  his  station, 
prepared  for  him.  It  was  the  station  next  below 
Devil's  Pulpit,  toward  Janver.  Oddly  enough  it 
was  located  exactly  at  the  spot  where  Lightfoot 
had  found  Joyce  Maitland  unconscious  in  the 
snow,  nearly  four  weeks  before  that  night. 

The  men  on  the  off-shifts  had  been  called  from 
their  rest-houses.  The  remarkable  thing  about 
them  was  that  not  one  of  them  grumbled.  They 
understood  what  they  had  enlisted  for,  and  they 
were  well  paid  for  it.  One  and  all  were  ready  and 
willing  to  obey  Randall's  orders. 

There  were  a  hundred  and  fifty  of  them.  (Bux- 
ton would  have  nearly  twice  that  number,  but 
then,  he  was  more  likely  to  need  them  than  Ran- 
dall.) Dan  divided  them  into  two  commands. 
One  he  put  under  Miron  for  the  north  side  of  the 
pass;  the  other  for  the  south  side  he  took  charge 
of  himself. 


280  UP  AGAINST  IT 

It  did  not  take  him  long  to  tell  them  what  they 
were  expected  to  do,  and  they  received  the  in- 
formation with  cheers. 

He  divided  his  personal  following  into  three 
squads,  placing  each  one  under  a  foreman;  and 
then  the  men  were  taken  to  the  tops  of  the  cliffs, 
and  the  march  downward,  to  meet  Taggart's  men, 
was  begun. 

When  a  third  of  the  distance  had  been  covered, 
Randall  ordered  one  of  the  squads  to  halt,  showed 
the  men  where  to  lay  their  mines,  and  explained 
how  he  v/anted  them  placed. 

"When  you  get  that  done,"  he  directed  them, 
"stow  yourselves  away,  and  wait.  There  won't 
be  a  thing  for  you  to  do  until  all  the  rest  of  us  have 
returned  here,  where  you  are  now.  If  there  is  any 
hand-to-hand  fighting  to  be  done,  which  I  very 
much  doubt,  it  will  be  done  right  here.  So  you 
won't  miss  anything." 

Farther  down  he  stationed  the  second  squad  in 
the  same  manner,  and  with  practically  the  same 
orders.  And  he  left  the  greater  part  of  the  third 
squad  there,  also.  He  took  only  ten  of  the  men 
with  him  when  he  started  on  again. 

Just  as  dawn  was  beginning  to  break,  and  the 
gray  was  showing  through  the  black,  he  arrived  at 
the  spot  he  had  selected  for  the  shooting  of  the 
first  blasts. 

Dan  assumed  that  Taggart's  men  would  be  just 
about  beginning  to  move,  by  then.  It  would  con- 
sume half  an  hour  or  more  for  them  to  climb  to 
that  spot. 

He  helped  with  his  own  hands  to  lay  the  three 
small  blasts  that  he  had  determined  to  send  off; 


THE  DYNAMITE  ATTACK  281 

three  in  line,  fifty  to  sixty  feet  apart,  at  right  an- 
gles with  Magician's  pass. 

There  was  a  steep  decline  just  below  the  point 
he  selected.  When  Taggart's  men  should  begin 
the  ascent  of  it  Dan  meant  to  shoot  the  first  of  his 
three  mines. 

He  knew  that  the  attacking  party  would  be 
startled  and  frightened,  and  more  than  likely  they 
would  scatter  and  run  for  it.  And,  to  accelerate 
any  such  condition,  he  added  a  fourth,  and  smaller 
blast  to  the  list,  by  placing  one  stick  of  the  dyna- 
mite beneath  a  large,  almost  round  rock,  that  hung 
directly  upon  the  edge  of  the  brow  of  that  sharp 
decline. 

The  firing-batteries  he  directed  the  men  to 
carry  back  some  distance  among  the  trees,  pre- 
ferring to  remain  on  watch,  himself,  to  give  the 
first  alarm  of  the  approach  of  the  enemy;  and  in 
order  that  there  might  be  no  mistake,  he  went  off 
to  one  side,  and  hid  himself  behind  a  rock  from 
whence  he  could  command  the  approach  to  the 
mines,  as  well  as  be  in  a  position  to  signal  to  his 
own  men. 

Daylight  grew  brighter.  Over  in  Magician,  at 
the  eastern  side  of  the  mountains,  the  sun  was 
risen.  A  murmur  of  masculine  voices  floated  up 
to  Dan  Randall's  listening  ears. 

He  bent  forward  to  look  down  upon  them  when 
they  should  emerge  from  the  edge  of  the  woods 
into  the  opening  at  the  foot  of  that  short  hill,  at 
the  top  of  which  the  mines  were  set  and  ready,  and 
over  which  the  round  boulder  with  one  stick  under 
it  hung  suspended.  He  was  smiling  grimly  while 
he  awaited  Taggart's  men. 


282  UP  AGAINST  IT 

They  came  into  view  in  single  file.  Taggart, 
himself  led  the  way. 

At  the  foot  of  the  short  hill  Taggart  halted,  and 
waited  for  his  men  to  come  up  beside  him.  Evi- 
dently he  believed  the  point  had  been  reached 
when  he  should  give  them  their  final  instructions. 

Nothing  could  have  been  better  for  Dan's  pur- 
poses. There  were  more  than  a  hundred  of  them, 
and  they  gathered  around  their  big  leader,  milling 
like  a  bunch  of  cattle,  eager  to  begin  the  work  of 
devastation  they  had  started  out  to  do. 

Randall  watched  and  waited  patiently  until  he 
.saw  signs  of  the  end  of  the  conference.  Then  he 
lifted  his  arm  and  gave  the  signal  to  his  own  men 
which  would  set  off  the  first  blasts  in  the  war  for 
the  possession  of  Magician  pass. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

Stampeding  the  Enemy 

Taggart's  men  had  taken  not  more  than  two 
steps  forward  when  the  first  shot  was  set  off. 

They  had  started  in  an  unformed  line,  without 
order.  Every  man  of  them  carried  revolvers  at 
their  hips,  and  each  had  a  belt  filled  with  car- 
tridges. 

In  addition  there  were  many  who  carried  burlap 
and  canvas  sacks  over  their  shoulders,  which  Dan 
knew  were  filled  with  sticks  of  dynamite.  It  is  the 
natural  weapon  of  the  hard-rock  man.  He  knows 
more  about  its  uses  than  concerning  any  other 
form  of  attack  or  defense. 

Knowing  it  so  well,  he  also  had  a  wholesome 
fear  of  it  whenever  he  is  not,  himself,  the  person 
who  is  using  it.  And  as  for  the  "skinners"  and 
other  railroad  workers— they  have  had  the  dread 
of  it  ground  into  them  by  years  of  battling  and 
fighting  with  the  regular  users  of  it. 

If  you  have  ever  heard  a  gun  go  off  behind  you, 
in  the  dark,  when  you  were  not  expecting  it,  you 
can  realize  something  of  the  effect  of  that  first  shot 
upon  Taggart's  men.  If  you  have  ever  "jumped' ' 
when  somebody  "booed"  at  you  from  behind  a 
door  you  can  imagine  how  that  bunch  jumped 
when  that  first  stick  of  dynamite  was  shot  off. 

At  first  they  huddled  together,  affrighted.  Then 
many  of  them  started  to  run. 


284  UP  AGAINST  IT 

They  had  begun  to  scatter  by  the  time  the  two 
seconds'  interval  had  elapsed,  although  many  still 
held  their  ground,  dominated  by  the  voice  of  Tag- 
gart,  who  was  calling  to  them  in  his  most  brutal 
and  commanding  tones. 

Then  the  second  shot. 

It  was  more  directly  in  front  of  the  startled 
group.  The  stones,  and  dirt,  and  limbs  of  trees, 
that  Dan's  men  had  piled  over  it  when  it  was  laid, 
were  of  a  different  character  from  the  debris  that 
had  covered  the  first  blast. 

They  were  hurled  in  every  direction.  A  shower 
of  gravel  and  fragments  of  rock  rained  down  upon 
the  slope,  unpleasantly  close  to  Taggart's  men. 
One  small  stone  struck  the  foremost  of  the  lot  and 
knocked  him  down.  A  huge  limb  of  a  tree  tipped 
over  several  others;  but,  apparently,  without  in- 
jury to  any,  for  they  sprang  to  their  feet  and  began 
to  scatter  for  distance  and  shelter.  Taggart  was 
furious.  He  leaped  in  front  of  them.  He  yelled 
at  them,  swore  at  them,  and  he  did  not  hesitate  to 
use  his  big  fists  in  his  effort  to  quell  the  threatened 
stampede.  Then  came  the  third  shot— and  with 
barely  an  interval  to  succeed  it,  the  single  stick 
that  had  been  laid  under  the  boulder  that  stood  at 
the  summit  of  the  steep  slope,  was  shot.  It  was 
directly  in  front  of  the  terrified  men. 

It  was  not  powerful  enough  to  rend  the  rock 
under  which  it  had  been  placed,  but  it  lifted  the 
boulder  several  inches  from  its  resting  place  and 
sent  it  careening  down  the  slope  of  the  hill,  di- 
rectly toward  the  now  thoroughly  frightened  and 
panic-stricken  men. 

Even  Taggart  could  not  hold  them  then. 


STAMPEDING  THE  ENEMY          285 

Even  he  had  begun  to  feel,  by  that  time,  that  the 
locality  was  decidedly  unhealthy.  Besides,  the 
big  rock  was  rolling  down  the  hill,  and  gaining  mo- 
mentum with  every  turn  it  made.  The  men  broke 
and  ran.  Taggart,  perforce,  followed  them.  There 
was  nothing  else  for  him  to  do. 

They  ran  toward  the  direction  from  whence  they 
had  come— and  at  that  instant  there  came  a  suc- 
cession of  three  booming  reports  from  the  cliffs 
at  the  opposite  side  of  the  canyon. 

Boss  Miron  was  beginning  to  get  in  his  work. 

Added  to  that,  one  of  Dan's  men  mischievously 
set  off  another  single  stick— and  after  it  there  fol- 
lowed two  more  thunderous  reports  from  the  oppo- 
site side  of  the  ravine. 

Panic?  Taggart  could  not  have  stayed  his  men, 
then,  had  he  tried;  and  he  did  not  try.  He  proved 
himself  to  be  quite  as  good  a  sprinter  as  any  of 
them,  for  a  short  distance  at  least. 

Dan  Randall,  watching  them,  laughed  quietly. 
He  knew  that  but  few  of  these  men  could  ever  be 
induced  to  return;  and  he  knew,  also,  that  there 
would  henceforth  be  little  occasion  to  fear  a  re- 
newal of  that  form  of  campaign.  Taggart 's  bullies 
would  still  fight,  no  doubt,  in  the  open,  and  face 
to  face  with  visible  foes.  Nobody  was  better  ac- 
quainted with  the  general  character  of  those  men 
than  Dan  Randall. 

As  soon  as  he  saw  the  last  one  disappear  among 
the  trees  toward  their  camp,  he  rejoined  his  own 
men  and  found  them  slapping  one  another  on  the 
backs,  slapping  their  own  thighs  in  glee,  cheering 
among  themselves  in  suppressed  voices,  laughing, 
all  of  them. 


286  UP  AGAINST  IT 

It  had  been  a  rout.  .  .  .  Nobody  had  been  hurt. 

Across  the  canyon,  where  Miron  had  been  sent 
to  meet  the  other  half  of  the  attacking  party,  the 
result  had  evidently  been  the  same,  for  Mir  on 's 
men  were  cheering. 

Dan  held  up  his  hand  and  called  his  men  around 
him. 

"That  was  splendid,"  he  said.  "We  sent  them 
backward  on  the  run,  and  without  injuring  a  man 
among  them.  That  is  as  it  should  be.  Remember, 
I  will  not  have  any  bloodshed,  or  casualties,  unless 
it  is  utterly  unavoidable;  only,  we  will  not  give  up 
the  pass,  even  if  it  has  to  come  to  that. 

"Three  cheers  for  Big  Chief  Randall!"  one  of 
the  men  called  out. 

'  'No, ' '  Dan  interrupted.  '  'We  haven't  time  for 
that.  There  is  no  occasion  for  it,  either.  If  there 
are  any  cheers  to  be  given,  they  should  be  for 
every  man  among  you.  But  there  is  no  need  for 
cheers." 

"Right  you  are,  sir,"  the  same  voice  called  out 
again. 

"But,  there  is  need  for  watchfulness;  now,  more 
than  ever,"  Dan  went  on.  "Some  of  those  men 
will  return.  Taggart  will  send  a  few  of  the  bravest 
of  them  back  again.  He  will  try  to  accomplish  by 
stealth  and  craft  what  he  just  now  failed  to  do.  He 
must  be  prevented." 

"Sure."    "You  bet,"  etc.,  etc. 

"He  will  send  out  scouts.  They  will  doubtless 
come  singly,  or  in  twos,  and  threes.  They  will 
try  to  throw  explosives  into  the  pass,  from  the  tops 
of  the  cliffs.  They  will  try  to  kill  now.  I  want 
you  to  go  back  to  the  other  squads.  I'll  put  Me- 


287 

Tavish  in  command,  for  I  am  going  in  the  other 
direction,  and  I  prefer  to  go  alone.  Mac,  step  out 
to  the  front." 

"Ay,  sir." 

"Select  twenty  men  out  of  the  whole  outfit  when 
you  get  back  to  the  others.  Put  them  at  the  next 
battery.  Stay  there  yourself,  in  command.  Keep 
carefully  on  the  watch  for  scouts  from  Taggart's 
camp.  Understand? ' ' 

"I  do,  sir." 

"If  there  is  another  attack,  or  the  threat  of, 
one,  meet  it  precisely  as  we  met  this  one.  Will 
you  do  that?" 

"I  will,  sir." 

"Can  I  depend  upon  all  of  you  to  obey  Mac,  and 
too  do  as  I  say?"  he  demanded  of  the  others. 

The  shout  that  went  up  in  reply  to  his  question 
was  sufficient  answer  to  it.  He  needed  no  other 
assurance. 

"I  have  a  duty  to  perform  which  I  must  do 
alone,"  he  told  them,  then.  "I  can  work  better, 
and  accomplish  more,  unaided.  While  I  am  away 
—which  will  be  cnly  a  few  hours  at  most,  I  believe 
—Mr.  Buxton  is  your  boss." 

He  waved  his  hand  toward  them  and  turned 
away;  and  they  stood  and  watched  him  as  he 
swung  down  the  side  of  the  mountain,  bearing  to- 
ward the  south.  If  they  wondered  whither  he  was 
bound  there  was  not  one  among  them  who  asked 
the  question  of  another. 

Possibly  each  one  had  his  own  ideas  as  to  Ran- 
dall's destination— based  upon  what  that  particu- 
lar individual  might  have  undertaken  to  do  him- 
self, if  he  were  boss. 


288  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Dan  Randall  was  bound  for  the  stone  house  at 
White  Lake,  where,  with  every  moment  that 
passed,  little  Yvonne  might  be  compelled  to  face 
the  deadliest  of  perils  for  any  woman;  where  it 
was  quite  possible  that  he  might  find  Joyce  Mait- 
land. 

After  that,  he  meant  to  rescue  Jules  Legarde. 

That  was  why  Dan  Randall  went  away  alone. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

Taggart 's  Villainous  Scheme 

Taggart  was  furious  when  his  men  were  routed 
in  that  manner. 

Before  they  had  gone  a  hundred  yards  down  the 
hill  toward  his  headquarters  he  began  calling  to 
them,  cursing  at  them,  and  using  every  effort  in  his 
power  to  stay  the  tide  of  the  stampede,  but  they 
had  covered  almost  a  mile  before  they  began  to 
lag  and  bunch  together,  and  finally  came  to  a  stop. 

Even  then  there  were  many  of  them  who  went 
onward,  determined  that  if  they  were  to  listen  to 
any  talking,  it  would  be  after  they  had  got  back  to 
camp. 

Taggart  could  not  prevail  upon  any  of  them  to 
return  to  the  attack. 

They  had  had  enough,  and  they  said  so,  plainly, 
and  Taggart  saw,  presently,  that  it  was  no  use  to 
urge.  He  gave  it  up. 

"There's  one  thing  plain,'*  he  told  them. 
' '  There 's  a  traitor  among  you,  somewhere.  I  ain't 
makin'  any  guesses,  because  I  don't  know  who  it 
is.  But  some  day  I'll  find  out,  and  if  it's  to-mor- 
row, or  a  year  from  now,  I'll  deal  with  that  man 
myself;  and  I'll  break  every  bone  in  his  body,  and 
then  some.  You  hear  me ! " 

Cuthbert  and  Crosby,  at  the  camp,  were  in- 


290  UP  AGAINST  IT 

formed  of  what  had  happened  by  the  men  who  ar- 
rived first— informed,  too,  that  the  same  thing  had 
happened  at  the  opposite  end  of  the  pass.  They 
met  Taggart  half  a  mile  outside  of  their  camp. 

"Crosby,"  Taggart  said,  "I  want  you  to  stay 
here  and  take  charge  of  things.  And  I  want  you, 
Cuthbert,  to  go  with  me  to  White  Lake.  We'll 
take  that  Frenchman  with  us."  He  wheeled  upon 
one  of  his  bullies,  and  added:  "Triton,  go  and  get 
Jules  Legarde,  and  bring  him  here  to  me.  Take 
the  lashings  off  of  his  feet,  but  leave  them  on  his 
wrists,  just  as  they  are.  Be  quick  about  it,  too." 

"What  are  you  going  to  do  at  White  Lake?" 
Crosby  demanded.  "It  seems  to  me  that  the  place 
to  stay,  and  get  busy,  is  here." 

"You  shut  your  trap,  Orme.  I  know  what  I'm 
about,"  was  the  hot  retort. 

"What  the  hell  do  you  want  to  go  to  White 
Lake  for?"  Cuthbert  demanded,  in  his  turn. 
"Can't  you  see  that " 

"You  shut  your  trap,  too,  Cuthbert,  or  I'll  shut 
it  for  you,"  Taggart  interrupted,  savagely.  "I 
ain't  in  no  mood  for  dilly-dallyin',  just  now.  Any 
fool  could  tell  that  there's  something  doin'  over 
White  Lake  way.  Didn't  Jules  come  from  that  di- 
rection when  we  nabbed  him?  Ain't  Lightfoot 
disappeared,  and  didn't  I  send  him  over  the  moun- 
tain after  Jules  the  mornin'  after  the  last  storm? 
And  so,  ain't  it  likely  that  the  Frenchman  got 
him?" 

"Well,  what  if  he  did?" 
'He  got  the  satchel,  too,  didn't  he?" 
'Maybe.    But  what  has  the  satchel  got  to  do 
with  this  job?" 


«i 


TAGGART'S  VILLAINOUS  SCHEME      291 

Taggart  bent  forward  and  shook  his  huge  fist 
in  Cuthbert's  face. 

"I'll  tell  you  what  it's  got  to  do  with  it,  if  you're 
too  big  a  damfool  to  see  it,"  he  replied,  tensely. 
"It's  got  this  to  do  with  it:  It's  my  belief  that  that 
little  black  satchel  was  crammed  full  of  money. 
That's  what?" 

Both  men  stared. 

"Who,  among  the  lot  of  us,  has  any  idea  who 
Randall  really  is?"  Taggart  went  on,  grinding  the 
words  out  in  half  suppressed  fury;  and  answered 
the  question  himself.  "Not  one  of  us.  But  this 
we  do  know.  We  know  that  he  came  here,  and 
took  hold  of  the  M.  &  J.,  when  it  didn't  have  a  leg 
to  stand  on.  We  know  that  he  found  the  money, 
somewhere,  to  do  it  with.  We  don't  know  where 
he  did  find  it,  but  we  know  that  he  got  it.  Well, 
wherever  he  got  that,  he  could  get  more,  couldn't 
he?" 

"Possibly,"  said  Cuthbert,  who  was  skeptical 
about  money  matters,  always— until  he  saw  the 
color  of  it. 

1 '  Look  here,  you!"  Taggart  continued.  "  I ' ve 
been  sendin'  out  scouts  to  git  facts,  ever  since  Ran- 
dall begun  this  last  play  of  his.  Do  you  know 
what  he  had  piled  up  in  them  places  where  we 
thought  he'd  only  gathered  the  material  for  this 
spring's  repairs?  Ain't  ye  seen  enough  to  tell  you 
that?  He  had  all  the  material  he  needed  to  build 
this  Cvt-off,  you  infernal  idiots" 

"Of  course  we  know  that now,"  said  Crosby, 

mildly. 

"Oh!  You  know  it  now,  do  you?  Well,  how'd 
he  get  all  them  men  away  from  us,  to  work  in  the 


292  UP  AGAINST  IT 

pass?  How'd  he  git  'em  away  from  old  Gregory? 
How'd  he  git  'em  away  from  the  B.  S.  &  L.  S.? 
With  money!  There  wasn't  no  other  way  to 
git  'em,  was  there?  It's  money  that  talks  in  this 
country." 

"Of  course.     But  all  the  same " 

"Aw,  shut  up.  What  did  he  come  back  to  Jan- 
ver  from  Carrolton  for,  through  that  storm  before 
the  last  one,  an'  bring  that  bag,  if  it  didn't  have 
the  cash  inside  of  it  to  make  his  first  payments  to 
the  men  he  intended  to  hire." 

Cuthbert  nodded. 

"That's  where  we  made  our  big  mistake,"  he 
said.  "If  we  had  waited,  and  not  sprung  thatj 
business  on  him  so  soon,  he'd  have  given  the  whole 
snap  away  to  us,  that  day  of  the  meeting." 

"Sure,  he  would.  He  thought  we  was  with 
him,  then,"  Taggart  replied,  mollified.  "I  have; 
been  puttin'  two  an'  two  together,  Cuthbert.  You 
can  bet  on  it  that  that  black  satchel  was  crammed 
full  of  money— to  the  limit.  And  you  can  bet  that 
Randall  intended  to  use  that  money  to  get  the  men 
to  build  the  pass.  And  you  can  bet  on  one  more 
thing,  too." 

"What?" 

"That  there  ain't  been  any  chance  to  get  anyi 
more  money  from  anywhere,  since  he  brought  thati 
bag  into  Janver.  That's  what." 

"Well?'' 

"Well?  .  .  .  Well?  Well?  You  jackass!  Don't 
you  see  that  if  Randall  ain't  got  the  black  bag,  he 
ain't  got  the  cash?  And  if  he  ain't  got  the  cash, 
he  can't  pay  off  the  men?  And  that  if  he  can't 
pay  off  the  men,  they'll  turn  on  him  like  so  many 


TAGGART'S  VILLAINOUS  SCHEME      293 

wolves,  and  tear  him  apart?  And  don't  you  see 
that  if  we  can  keep  him  from  gettin'  that  money, 
the  hull  damned  Cut-off  is  goin'  to  drop  right 
down  into  our  laps?" 

Both  men  nodded,  wisely.    They  saw  the  point. 

"You  just  let  me  get  my  paws  onto  that  black 
satchel,  an'  what's  inside  of  it,  an'  I'll  set  right 
down  here  on  my  hindquarters,  an'  wait  for  Ran- 
dall to  finish  the  job,"  Taggart  finished,  with  a 
wide  grin.  "He'll  be  workin'  for  us,  all  of  the 
time;  that's  what  he'll  be  doin'." 

"Well,  how  are  you  going  to  get  your  hands 
on  it?"  Crosby  inquired,  visibly  affected  by  what 
he  had  heard. 

"You  want-a  know?"  Taggart  asked. 

"Yes." 

"I'm  goin'  to  take  the  Frenchman  over  to  White 
Lake.  I'm  goin'  to  make  him  tell  me  where  he  hid 
that  satchel.  If  I  can't  make  him  tell  me,  I'll 
make  his  wife  tell  me—or,  Ftt  make  his  wife 
make  him  tell  me.  See?" 

"'  guess  so,"  Cuthbert  replied,  with  a  half 
shudder. 

"If  I  can't  torture  him  into  givin'  up  what  he 
knows,  I  know  a  way,  through  her,  that'll 
make  him  open  his  mouth  so  wide  you  could  drop 
the  whole  dictionary  between  his  jaws.  You  hear 
me!  She  's  a  purty  little  thing,  too— at  that. 
.  .  .  Here  comes  Triton,  with  Jules.  Cuthbert,  you 
call  to  that  hellion  of  yours,  an'  tell  him  to  come 
along  with  us.  He's  about  the  cut  of  cloth  that  we 
want  along  with  us  for  a  job  of  this  sort.  We'll 
know  more'n  we  do  now,  when  we  git  back,  or  my 
name  ain't  Taggart." 


Randall  had  about  the  same  distance  to  travel  to 
get  to  the  stone  house  at  White  Lake  as  the  others, 
but  the  way  was  much  more  difficult.  On  the 
other  hand  he  had  a  little  advantage  over  them  in 
that  he  knew  the  exact  location  of  the  cottage, 
while  they  did  not. 

But,  in  the  "hellion"  of  Cuthbert's,  to  whom 
Taggart  had  referred  so  graphically,  they  had  a 
trailer  from  the  North  who  could  follow  a  track 
where  none  was  visible  to  other  eyes.  He  was 
called  Duprez,  and  if  his  character  was  as  villain- 
ous as  his  countenance,  nothing  more  need  be  said. 
Common  report  had  it  that  he  was  even  worse. 

So,  in  that  party  there  were  Taggart,  Cuthbert, 
Triton,  Duprez  the  hellion,  and  Jules— dear  old 
Jules  with  his  wrists  tied  together  behind  his  back, 
with  bruises  upon  his  face  where  he  had  been) 
roughly  handled  at  the  time  of  his  capture,  and 
with  the  muscles  and  joints  of  his  legs  stiff  and 
sore  and  unwieldy  from  the  bonds  that  had  con- 
fined them  since  he  was  taken  prisoner. 

But  Jules'  spirit  was  as  strong  as  ever.  Out- 
wardly he  was  the  same  as  if  nothing  had  hap-1 
pened  to  him.  He  made  no  comment,  offered  no 
protest,  said  nothing,  when  he  was  hustled  forward 
by  the  others. 


AT  THE  STONE  HOUSE  295 

The  hellion  took  the  lead  after  they  had  gone  a 
little  distance.  He  was  attempting  to  follow  the 
black  trail  of  Jules,  made  at  the  time  of  his  cap- 
ture; and,  until  they  arrived  at  a  certain  point, 
which,  as  it  happened,  was  about  an  equal  distance 
from  the  lake,  if  they  kept  on  straight  ahead,  and 
from  the  stone  house  if  they  turned  off  to  the  left, 
Duprez  made  no  difficulty  of  it. 

There  they  came  to  a  stop. 

"Which  way,  now?"  Taggart  demanded  of 
Jules. 

Jules  made  no  reply,  and  Taggart  struck  him 
with  his  fist,  and  knocked  him  down;  he  remained 
so  until  they  went  to  him  and  stood  him  on  his  feet 
again.  Then  he  merely  shrugged  his  wide  shoul- 
ders, disdaining  to  speak  at  all. 

He  knew  that  he  was  utterly  helpless;  but  all  the 
same  he  did  not  intend  to  guide  these  men  to  the 
stone  house,  and  to  Yvonne.  Not  he. 

But,  also,  he  had  no  doubt  of  the  ability  of 
Duprez  to  find  the  trail,  and  follow  it,  if  he  made 
the  attempt.  And  after  a  moment  the  hellion  did 
make  the  effort. 

It  happened  that  old  Pitou  had  been  out  that 
way  the  preceding  evening,  seeking  for  a  trace  of 
Jules.  The  old  man  had  not  been  over  careful  to 
conceal  his  trail,  and  it  was  that  which  Duprez 
discovered  presently. 

He  signalled  to  the  others,  and  they  started  on 
again,  going,  this  time,  directly  toward  the  place 
they  sought. 

One  might  have  passed  within  a  few  rods  of  the 
stone  house  without  suspecting  its  presence,  so 
deftly  had  it  been  hidden  away  beside  the  moun- 


296  UP  AGAINST  IT 

tain  by  the  unknown  pioneer  who  had  built  it  so 
long  ago  that  it  as  well  as  its  builder  had  been 
forgotten. 

Only  the  front  of  it  showed,  even  when  one  was 
close  to  it;  the  front,  and  a  small  section  of  one 
side.  The  rest  of  it  extended  back  into  the  moun- 
tain itself,  formed  by  a  spacious  cavern  which  the 
builder  had  probably  blasted  out  for  his  uses. 

But  these  men  found  it.  The  trail  of  old  Pitou 
led  them  directly  to  it. 

It  was  hidden  behind  a  thick  growth  of  trees, 
and  a  small  clearing  had  to  be  crossed  before  one 
arrived  at  the  porch,  and  entrance. 

Yvonne  was  standing  just  in  front  of  the  porch, 
looking  directly  toward  them,  when  they  came  out 
of  the  wood  into  view. 

She  knew  Taggart,  of  course,  and  Cuthbert,  and 
the  other  two  as  well— and  she  saw  Jules,  and 
realized  in  that  one  quick  glance  that  he  was  bound 
and  a  prisoner. 

They  were  still  a  dozen  rods  or  more  away  from 
her,  and  after  that  one  swift  glance  toward  them, 
she  turned  and  fled  into  the  house. 

Taggart  and  the  others  saw  her. 

Taggart  yelled  at  her  as  he  started  to  run  toward 
her;  the  others  came  to  a  halt  and  waited. 

There  were  two  doors  and  two  windows  to  the 
house;  and— well,  they  had  all  been  constructed 
for  the  purpose  of  keeping  people  on  the  outside. 

Yvonne  lost  no  time  in  closing  the  inside  doors 
that  were  made  of  heavy  planks  of  oak,  bolted  one 
upon  another,  and  supplied  with  bars  as  heavy  to 
hold  them  shut.  The  windows  were  the  same. 
Nothing  short  of  dynamite  could  open  them  from 


AT  THE  STONE  HOUSE  297 

the  outside.  Fire  would  not  burn  them,  and  the 
house  itself  was  made  of  rough,  unhewn  rocks. 
But  for  the  windows  and  doors  and  the  little  porch, 
the  house  might  have  looked  to  be  a  part  of  the 
mountain. 

Taggart  came  to  a  halt  a  dozen  feet  away.  Then 
he  turned  and  called  to  the  others.  When  they 
had  joined  him,  he  turned  again,  and  called  aloud. 

"Hello,  there!"  he  said.    "Come  out  of  that." 

He  started  backward  when  a  voice  replied  to 
him  from  some  place  that  was  seemingly  over  his 
head.  And  looking  up  he  could  not  discover  where 
it  came  from— unless  it  was  shouted  at  him 
through  a  small  hole  in  the  cliff,  above  and  behind 
the  house-front. 

"What  do  you  want?"  the  voice  demanded. 

It  was  the  voice  of  a  man,  too,  and  Taggart 
glanced  toward  his  companions  uneasily;  but 
Triton  grinned  at  him,  and  said: 

"Dat  ees  old  Pitou  spikin',  m'sieu.  Heem  dere 
weeth  Yvonne,  mabby." 

Taggart  faced  toward  the  house  again. 

"We  want  you  to  come  out  here,"  he  said,  sav- 
agely. "If  you  don't  do  it,  we'll  find  a  way  to 
bring  you  out.  You  get  back,  away  from  that  hole, 
Pitou,  or  I'll  send  a  bullet  into  it.  Tell  Yvonne 
that  I  want  to  talk  to  her.  Tell  her  it's  Taggart 
that's  talkin'." 

"What  for  you  come  here,  m'sieu  Taggart?"  the 
voice  of  Yvonne  called  out,  after  a  moment  of  si- 
lence, although  nothing  of  her  face  could  be  seen. 

"Can't  you  see  that  we've  brought  Jules  back 
to  you,  Yvonne?"  Taggart  replied,  and  grinned 
when  he  said  it. 


298  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"He  did  not  want  to  come,  else  he  not  be  tied 
up,"  she  said,  in  return. 

"Ask  him  whether  he  wanted  to  come  or  not," 
Taggart  announced. 

"No,  m'sieu  Taggart.  I  talk  weeth  you,  now; 
not  weeth  Jules.  Untie  him,  and  then  I  will  talk 
weeth  him.  Those  streengs,  they  bind  his  tongue 
just'  sam'  as  they  bind  his  wreests.  For  sure, 
m'sieu." 

"Oh.  They  do,  do  they?"  Taggart  half  turned 
and  struck  Jules  in  the  face  with  the  flat  of  his 
big  hand.  "Maybe  that'll  loosen  his  tongue,"  he 
said. 

Jules  did  not  so  much  as  wince  under  the  blow. 
He  had  expected  something  of  the  sort  and  was 
prepared  for  it.  The  voice  of  Yvonne  came  to; 
them  through  the  hole  in  the  cliff,  sharply  and 
clearly. 

"M'sieu  Taggart,  if  you  do  that  once  more,  I, 
Yvonne,  will  shoot  you  dead  where  you  stan'," 
she  said;  and  she  uttered  the  words  without  ex- 
citement, coolly,  implacably. 

Taggart 's  reply  was  a  shot  from  his  own  re- 
volver which  he  pulled  from  his  belt  and  fired| 
without  taking  aim.  He  did  not  even  try  to  send 
the  bullet  through  the  hole,  for  he  had  no  idea  of 
injuring  pretty  Yvonne  in  that  manner. 

"That  will  give  you  an  idea  of  what  I  will  do, 
Yvonne,  unless  you  come  out  here,  as  I  order  you 
to  do,"  he  called  out  to  her— and  received  no 
reply.  Dead  silence  was  the  only  answer  he  got. 

He  waited  a  moment,  and  then  called  again  to 
her;  and  still  received  no  response. 

"Triton,"  he  ordered,  "you  leg  it  back  to  the 


AT  THE  STONE  HOUSE  299 

camp,  and  fetch  some  dynamite.  That  will  let  us 
in,  if  it  won't  bring  them  out.  We'll  see.  G'wan. 
Run!" 

It  was  just  at  that  moment  when  Triton  started 
away  to  obey  the  last  order  that  Dan  Randall  ar- 
rived upon  the  scene. 

He  overheard  Taggart's  last  order,  too. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

Dan  Randall's  Strategy 

Dan  had  arrived  from  across  the  hills.  He  had 
come  straight  through  the  woods  floundering 
through  some  of  the  drifts  of  snow  which  still  re- 
mained unmelted  under  the  trees. 

But,  in  order  to  approach  the  house  he  had  been 
obliged  to  make  a  short  detour,  and  the  conse- 
quence was  that  he  came  up  directly  behind  the 
men  who  had  already  arrived.  He  was,  in  fact, 
only  a  few  paces  back  from  the  spot  where  Yvonne 
from  the  door,  had  first  discovered  Taggart  and 
his  companions. 

So,  Triton  was  obliged  to  go  past  Dan  Randall 
when  he  started  to  do  his  master's  bidding.  And 
Triton  had  been  ordered  to  fetch  dynamite. 

Dan  managed  to  move  back  a  few  paces  before 
Triton  started,  and  thus  he  put  more  trees  and 
other  obstacles  between  himself  and  the  clearing  in 
front  of  the  house. 

He  had  to  wait  but  a  moment  after  that  before 
Triton  came  up  to  him;  Triton,  with  his  elbows 
close  to  his  sides  and  his  head  hunched  down  be- 
tween his  shoulders  and  his  body  bent  slightly  for- 
ward in  the  characteristic  position  for  swift  run- 
ning. 

Triton  had  no  idea  of  an  obstacle  in  his  path 


DAN  RANDALL'S  STRATEGY    301 

until  Dan  rose  upon  before  him.  Dan  might  !i.*ve 
tripped  and  thrown  the  man  easily,  but  Triton 
would  have  bellowed  out,  and  if  that  were  to  hap- 
pen, Taggart  would  be  warned. 

So  Dan  merely  stepped  directly  in  front  of  the 
running  man  at  the  proper  moment,  holding  a  lev- 
eled revolver  in  his  right  hand,  with  a  muzzle* 
pointing  at  that  part  of  Triton's  body  which  Triton 
loved  the  most— his  stomach. 

Triton  stopped. 

"Don't  speak,  or  make  a  sound,"  said  Dan. 

Triton  did  not. 

"March,"  said  Dan,  "in  exactly  the  same  direc- 
tion you  were  going." 

Triton  marched.  He  did  it  without  comment. 
He  understood  what  the  muzzle  of  the  gun  that  was 
pointing  at  him  might  mean,  and  he  knew  the  man 
who  held  that  gun. 

Dan,  on  his  part,  realized  that  there  was  no  oc- 
casion for  haste.  Taggart  would  not  attempt  any 
urther  move  at  the  house  until  the  return  of  Triton 
with  the  explosive,  and  at  the  very  best  it  would 
have  taken  Triton  a  full  half  hour  to  go  to  the 
camp  and  return. 

So  Dan  marched  his  prisoner  into  the  woods,  di- 
recting him  by  a  devious  pathway  that  he  knew 
well,  and  stopped  him,  presently,  near  a  place 
where  cord  wood  had  been  piled  and  left  to  season. 

There  Dan  disarmed  and  bound  the  man,  using 
Triton's  own  belt,  which  he  cut  in  twain,  length- 
wise, for  the  purpose;  using,  also,  some  leather 
thongs  which  he  found  in  Triton's  pouch,  and 
which  had  been  originally  intended  to  repair  snow- 
shoes.  He  gagged  Triton  with  Triton's  necker- 


302  UP  AGAINST  IT 

chief,  which,  until  then,  had  been  of  little  use  save 
as  an  ornament. 

When  he  had  finished  Triton  was  as  helpless  as 
a  tortoise  on  its  back.  We  have  already  discov- 
ered that  Dan  Randall  was  in  the  habit  of  doing 
things  thoroughly. 

"Now,  Triton,"  he  said;  "perhaps  I'll  come 
back  after  you;  possibly  I  may  not.  If  your  friends 
should  happen  to  kill  me,  I  won't  be  able  to  do  so. 
If  I  don't,  you'll  probably  rot  here.  But  the 
chances  are  that  I  will  return." 

Triton  remained  stolidly  indifferent,  after  the 
manner  of  his  kind,  and  Dan  turned  his  back  on 
the  man  and  went  away. 

He  sought  the  same  place  where  he  had  sur- 
prised Triton,  concealed  himself  as  well  as  he  could 
behind  the  trunks  of  three  trees  that  had  grown 
up  closely  together,  and  waited. 

He  knew  that  after  a  time,  when  Triton  had 
been  gone  long  enough,  Taggart  would  become  im- 
patient; and  Dan  hoped  that  Cuthbert,  or  Duprez 
might  be  sent  out  to  look  for  him. 

"If  that  happens,"  he  murmured,  answering  his 
own  thought,  "it  will  reduce  their  forces  to  two. 

I  shouldn't  wonder  if "  he  stopped  there;  but 

he  smiled  to  himself;  a  little  wistful  smile  of  an- 
ticipation. 

Waiting  was  never  Randall's  long  suit,  but  he 
could  wait,  as  well  as  act,  when  occasion  re- 
quired it. 

He  could  also  see,  by  bending  forward,  and  peer- 
ing through  the  trees  toward  the  clearing. 

Taggart  was  pacing  impatiently  up  and  down  in 
front  of  Cuthbert,  who  had  seated  himself  upon  a 


DAN  RANDALL'S  STRATEGY         303 

convenient  stump.  Jules  had  been  ordered  to 
squat  upon  the  ground,  and  evidently  realizing 
that  there  was  no  present  hope  of  escape  was^ 
gazing  stolidly  toward  the  house,  behind  the  walls 
of  which  he  knew  that  Yvonne  was  safe,  as  yet. 
And  Jules  had  infinite  faith  in  his  belief  that  noth- 
ing very  terrible  could  happen  to  Yvonne. 

Taggart  made  no  effort  to  question  Jules.  He 
knew  that  it  would  be  useless.  He  thoroughly  un- 
derstood that  the  only  way  in  which  Jules  could 
be  made  to  talk,  if  at  all,  would  be  to  threaten 
Yvonne  with  some  awful  consequences,  in  Jules' 
presence. 

Cuthbert  and  Taggart  talked  together  while 
they  waited.  Duprez  smoked  his  pipe  in  silence, 
near  them,  purposely  blowing  the  smoke  in  Jules' 
face  at  times,  knowing  that  the  latter  would  give 
much  for  a  smoke  himself. 

Taggart  looked  at  his  watch  frequently  as  the 
time  approached  for  the  return  of  Triton.  He 
grumbled  profanely  each  time  he  looked  at  the  dial 
and  the  profanity  became  more  profuse,  and  elo- 
quent of  his  temper,  as  the  time  passed. 

At  last  he  closed  it  with  a  snap. 

"I'd  like  to  know  what  in Say,  you! 

Duprez!  Chase  yourself  back  there  a  ways,  an' 
see  if  you  can  find  that  other  hellion,"  he  inter- 
rupted himself.  "I  suppose  the  fool  thought  that 
I  wanted  a  ton  of  the  stuff,  and  is  trying  to  bring 
it  all  at  once,"  he  added  to  Cuthbert,  when  Duprez 
started  to  obey. 

Cuthbert  nodded  as  if  he  thought  that  that 
might  be  the  explanation.  They  both  turned  to 
watch  after  Duprez,  as  he  departed. 


304  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Dan  Randall  kept  himself  down,  out  of  sight  be- 
hind the  trees,  in  the  meantime. 

He  knew  that  he  had  quite  a  different  character 
to  deal  with  in  Duprez  than  Triton  had  proved  to 
be.  Duprez  was  as  big  as  Taggart;  one  might 
have  said,  if  one  had  not  taken  measurements,  that 
he  was  as  big  as  Randall.  He  was  called  the 
toughest  Frenchman  in  that  section  of  the  North- 
west, and  that  was  saying  a  lot. 

Randall  was  not  at  all  sure  that  the  "hellion" 
would  paas  bis  hiding  place  without  discovering 
him;  but  he  did;  and  Dan,  perceiving  that  the  oth- 
ers had  turned  towards  the  house  again,  followed 
swiftly  and  silently  after  him. 

A  hundred  yards  further  on  they  passed  out  of 
sight  from  the  vicinity  of  the  stone  house. 

A  small,  round  stone,  the  size  of  a  walnut,  caught 
Dan's  eye,  directly  in  the  path  in  front  of  him.  He 
picked  it  up.  With  unerring  aim— the  result  of 
long  practice  in  the  pitcher's  box  at  college  not  so 
very  long  ago — he  threw  it. 

The  stone  was  too  small  to  do  effective  work 
upon  such  a  head  as  Duprez',  and  the  fellow  still 
wore  his  fur  hood  pulled  down  over  his  bull- 
cranium.  Otherwise,  he  might  have  been  stunned, 
for  the  stone  struck  him  solidly,  in  the  middle  of 
the  back  of  his  head. 

As  it  was,  it  knocked  him  down,  sprawling  upon 
his  face;  for  he  had  been  running  with  his  body 
bent  forward,  and  with  elbows  close  to  his  sides. 

When  Dan  threw  the  stone,  he  ran  forward  with 
all  the  speed  he  could  muster. 

Duprez,  sprawling  and  startled,  heard  Dan  run- 
ning behind  him,  and  bounded  to  his  feet  like  a 


DAN  RANDALL'S  STRATEGY    305 

rubber  ball.  He  turned  at  the  same  time,  but  Dan 
was  upon  him,  and  took  a  flying  leap  at  him  as  they 
came  tog-ether. 

The  force  of  the  impact  was  considerable,  and 
Duprez  was  by  no  means  an  impassable  barrier. 
The  two  went  down  together,  Dan  on  top;  but  as 
they  fell,  Duprez  let  out  the  first  half  of  one  wild 
yell  of  warning.  The  second  half  of  it  was  stopped 
by  the  grasp  of  Randall's  right  hand  at  his  throat. 

Dan's  left  hand  did  the  rest  of  what  was  needed 
—or  rather,  the  fist  of  it  did  so.  It  put  Duprez  to 
sleep,  as  the  saying  goes  in  sporting  circles. 

But  that  outcry,  or  the  section  of  it  that  had 
found  utterance,  reached  the  ears  of  Taggart  and 
Cuthbert.  .  .  .  Likewise,  Jules  heard  it;  only 
Jules  did  not  appear  to  do  so.  He  was  still  gazing 
toward  the  house,  beyond  the  walls  of  which 
Yvonne  was  awaiting  him,  and  if  you  had  been 
watching  him  closely,  you  would  have  seen  him 
nod  his  head  slightly,  at  times,  as  if  he  saw  some- 
thing or  somebody  there  who  would  understand 
him. 

Taggart  and  Cuthbert  both  turned  to  face  the 
woods  when  they  heard  the  cry. 

Jules  gathered  his  feet  under  him  by  bringing 
them  together  in  an  odd,  cross-legged  shape. 

The  two  men  bent  forward  to  listen.  No  second 
sound  came  to  them,  and  the  first  cry  had  not  been 
intelligible. 

"Stay  here  an'  watch  the  breed,  El,"  Taggart 
ordered.  "I'll  see  what's  up." 

He  started  away  as  he  spoke.  Cuthbert  watched 
him— and  his  back  was  turned,  for  the  moment, 
toward  Jules. 


306  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Jules  lifted  himself  to  his  feet  without  a  sound, 
and  just  then  the  door  of  the  house  fell  ajar  ever 
so  little.  But  it  was  enough  so  that  Jules  saw  it. 

One,  two,  three  quick  steps  forward  he  took,  as 
softly  as  the  tread  of  a  panther.  Then  he  ran— ran 
like  a  scared  rabbit,  and  dove  forward  through  the 
doorway  that  Yvonne  was  holding  open  for  him, 
just  as  Cuthbert  wheeled,  pulled  his  gun,  and  fired. 

Then  the  door  banged  shut  again,  and  Ellery 
Cuthbert  stood  there,  alone. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 
A  Double-Headed  Fight 

Taggart  heard  the  shot  and  turned  back  before 
he  came  in  sight  of  Randall.  Dan  heard  it,  also, 
and  his  first  thought  was  that  Jules,  having  heard 
the  cry,  had  made  an  effort  to  escape,  and  had  been 
shot  down. 

He  threw  caution  to  the  winds,  then,  and  rushed 
forward  toward  the  house.  All  the  latent  fury 
within  him  was  roused  at  the  thought  that  Jules 
had  probably  been  murdered. 

Taggart  was  running,  too,  back  toward  the 
house,  for  Cuthbert,  after  firing  that  shot,  was 
calling  loudly  to  him  to  return. 

The  noise  made  by  his  own  feet  in  running,  and 
the  continued  shouting  of  Cuthbert,  prevented 
Taggart  from  hearing  the  approach  of  Randall, 
who,  nevertheless,  gained  rapidly. 

Dan  overtook  him  just  as  he  leaped  into  the 
clearing  in  front  of  the  house. 

It  was  then  that  Taggart  heard  him,  and  turned; 
but  as  he  made  the  turn,  Randall  fell  upon  him, 
and  they  went  to  the  ground  together,  with  Tag- 
gart making  frantic  efforts  to  reach  his  gun  and 
pull  it,  and  with  Dan  clinging  to  him  and  holding 
his  arms  so  that  he  could  not  do  so. 

At  the  same  instant  Cuthbert  darted  toward 


308  UP  AGAINST  IT 

them.  He  had  seen,  and  had  taken  in  at  a  glance, 
the  meaning  of  all  that  had  happened— or  thought 
he  had;  and  he  was  not  so  far  wrong,  at  that. 

He  ran  toward  them,  gun  in  hand,  prepared  to 
kill,  for  Cuthbert  was  as  dangerous  as  any  man  in 
that  wild  country  when  he  chose  to  be  so.  He  was 
the  sort  who  would  not  hesitate  to  approach  the 
two  men  who  struggled  together  on  the  ground, 
and  by  putting  the  muzzle  of  his  revolver  against 
Dan  Randall's  head,  blow  out  his  brains. 

That  was,  in  fact,  precisely  what  he  intended 
to  do. 

But  the  house  door  opened  a  second  time,  at 
exactly  the  same  instant  that  Cuthbert  turned  his 
back  upon  it,  and  when  Randall  and  Taggart 
rolled  upon  the  ground  together. 

Jules  darted  out  of  it. 

Jules,  unwounded;  bruised,  and  sore,  and  stiff, 
perhaps,  from  all  that  he  had  been  forced  to  en- 
dure; but  with  all  the  fury  of  a  she-lynx  in  defense 
of  its  young. 

Yvonne  had  cut  the  thongs  that  bound  his  wrists 
together  behind  his  back,  while  he  peered  through 
the  peep-hole  in  the  heavy  door  to  discover  what 
was  happening  outside  and  so  Jules  saw  his  be- 
loved m'sieu. 

Old  Pitou,  standing  just  inside  the  door  when 
Cuthbert  fired  the  shot,  had  crumpled  upon  the 
floor,  like  a  wet  dish-rag.  He  had  received  the 
bullet  intended  for  Jules,  but  there  was  no  time  to 
stop  for  that,  then. 

Cuthbert  did  not  know  that  the  door  had  opened 
a  second  time,  and  that  Jules  had  rushed  out  from 
it,  again. 


A  DOUBLE-HEADED  FIGHT          809 

He  did  not  know  that  with  every  stride  he  took, 
Jules  gained  upon  him  in  the  ratio  of  two  to 
one. 

There  was  fury  in  Cuthbert 's  heart,  and  fire  in 
his  brain,  and  murderous  lust  in  his  soul  by  the 
time  he  reached  the  two  struggling  men  on  the 
ground,  and  stretched  out  his  weaponed  hand  to 
deal  death  to  Randall. 

But  the  two  men  were  struggling  mightily,  and 
it  was  difficult  for  Cuthbert  to  make  sure  of  his 
aim,  even  at  that  close  range— and  so,  just  at  the 
instant  when  he  believed  that  he  might  be  certain 
of  it,  and  was  about  to  pull  the  trigger,  Jules 
struck  up  his  arm.  The  gun  was  knocked  from 
his  hand,  and  the  fingers  of  both  of  Jules'  hands 
were  at  his  throat. 

Thus,  a  double  battle,  portentous  and  terrible, 
was  on. 

Cuthbert  fought  with  all  his  strength.  He  struck 
with  his  fists,  scratched  with  his  nails,  tried  to  bite 
with  his  teeth— and  grew  blacker  in  the  face  all 
the  time,  for,  in  spite  of  it  all,  not  once  did  Jules 
relax  the  hold  of  those  ten  fingers  upon  Cuth- 
bert's throat. 

And  Cuthbert  withered  under  the  awful  strain 
of  it;  then  wilted;  then  relaxed;  then  succumbed 
entirely,  and  laid  quite  still  while  Jules  reached 
out  for  the  pistol  that  had  been  dropped,  and 
rapped  him  on  the  head  with  the  butt  of  it,  to  keep 
him  so. 

In  the  meantime,  Dan  tore  himself  by  main 
strength  from  the  grasp  of  Taggart's  mighty  arms; 
and  he  did  it  by  grasping  the  ex-lumberman's  thick 
hair  in  his  fingers  and  pulling  the  head  farther  and 


310  UP  AGAINST  IT 

farther  backward  until  Taggart  was  obliged  to 
release  his  own  hold  or  have  his  neck  broken. 

And  the  moment  he  did  release  that  hold  he  was 
lost. 

All  of  the  mighty  strength  that  Dan  Randall 
possessed  seemed  to  center  in  his  arms  as  he  bent 
forward  and  seized  Taggart  around  the  body,  lift- 
ing him  from  his  feet,  and  threw  him  down  upon 
the  ground  with  a  crashing  force  that  was  irre- 
sistible. 

Taggart  groaned,  and  made  an  effort  to  raise 
himself;  and  then,  as  Dan  took  a  step  forward  to 
administer  a  second  dose  of  the  same  medicine,  he 
closed  his  eyes  and  fell  back  again,  senseless  and 
inert. 

"Tie  them  up,  Jules,"  Dan  ordered,  a  bit  breath- 
lessly, for  Taggart  had  been  no  easy  mark  to' 
handle.  "We'll  carry  them  inside  the  house,  pres- 
ently. They  will  be  the  best  guards  we  could  have 
—for  keeping  their  outfit  from  blowing  up  the 
place  with  dynamite.  In  the  meantime  I'll  go  and 
bring  in  Duprez.  He  is " 

He  stopped. 

Something  touched  one  of  his  hands. 

He  turned  quickly  to  find  that  it  was  Yvonne's 
lips.  She  had  fallen  upon  her  knees  beside  him 
and  was  kissing  the  back  of  his  hand. 

"Oh,  m'sieu!  M'sieu!  I  am  so  glad,"  she  mur- 
mured. 

He  lifted  her  to  her  feet,  and  then  bent  forward 
and  brushed  her  forehead  with  his  lips. 

"So  am  I,  little  one,"  he  said  briskly.  "There 
now.  Help  Jules  with  these  men.  I  shouldn't 
wonder  if  Taggart  is  out  of  business,  Jules,"  he 


A  DOUBLE-HEADED  FIGHT          311 

added.  '  'Men  like  him  don't  faint  like  that,  unless 
something  is  busted  inside  of  them.  I'll  go  now, 
and  bring  in  Duprez.  Later,  we'll  get  Triton.  I 
got  him,  too.  He's  tied  up  out  here,  a  little  ways. ' ' 

He  was  turning  away  again,  when  Yvonne 
stopped  him  a  second  time. 

"M'sieu!"  she  said,  and  there  was  a  piteous, 
beseeching  expression  in  her  eyes. 

"Well,  little  one?"  he  replied,  stopping. 

"Tell  me  of  the  mademoiselle.  Please,  m'sieu. 
Where  is  she?" 

Randall  started— then  mentally  gripped  himself. 
He  had  been  so  certain  that  Joyce  would  be  there. 

"Joyce?  Is  she  not  here  with  you?  I  hoped— 
I  hoped  that  she  was  here.  Yes,  I  did  hope  it." 

"Non,  non,  non,  she  is  not  here,  m'sieu.  An' 
Jules,  he  not  know  where  she  is." 

"Jules  does  not  know?  Jules,  is  that  true? 
Where  is  she?" 

Jules  raised  his  eyes  slowly  to  his  master's  face. 

"Je  ne  sais  pas,"  he  replied,  simply. 

"You  did  not  find  her?  You  got  no  trace  of 
her?" 

"Non,  m'sieu.  I  not  fin'  ma'm'selle.  I  not  fin' 
Lightfoot.  I  not  fin'  the  sachet.  I  not  do  netting 
at  all.  Jules,  heem  no  good,  m'sieu.  Jules,  heem 
git  ol'.  Heem  back  number.  Heem  better  off  dead. 
Non?  Nec'estpas?" 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

Taking  the  Bull  by  the  Horns 

Dan  turned  away. 

The  information— or  rather  the  lack  of  it— com- 
ing as  it  did,  was  almost  more  than  he  could  bear. 
He  had  been  so  positive  that  the  presence  of  Jules 
as  a  captive  in  Taggart's  hands,  caught  while 
"coming  from  the  direction  of  White  Lake," 
meant  that  Joyce  had  been  found,  and  had  been 
taken  to  the  stone  house  to  be  cared  for  by  Yvonne. 

For  the  first  time  during  all  those  strenuous1 
days  that  had  come  and  gone,  Dan  began  to  doubt 
that  inner  assurance  which  he  called  his  sixth 
sense.  For  the  first  time  since  the  disappearance 
of  Joyce  he  wondered  if  she  were  indeed  alive— 
and  safe. 

Jules  had  not  found  her;  he  had  not  found  Light- 
foot;  he  had  not  found  the  little  black  satchel. 
Where,  then,  was  Joyce? 

Lightf oot,  of  course,  had  taken  the  satchel  from 
the  railroad  office;  there  was  no  doubt  of  that — 
that  it  had  been  he  who  struck  Jules  down  in  the 
dark,  and  stole  it. 

Had  Lightfoot  discovered  what  the  satchel  con- 
tained? Surely.  There  could  be  no  doubt  of  that. 
Had  the  Indian,  dazed  by  the  sudden  possession 
of  so  much  money— more  than  he  would  have  been 
able  to  count,  or  to  value— made  up  his  mind  to- 


TAKING  THE  BULL  BY  THE  HORNS      313 

keep  it,  to  desert  Taggart,  and  to  steal  Joyce,  too? 

These  thoughts  shot  through  his  brain  while  he 
hurried  along  toward  the  place  where  he  had 
struck  the  blow  that  had  knocked  out  Duprez. 

Duprez,  the  hellion,  should  have  been  there  still, 
senseless;  but  he  was  not.  Dan  shrugged,  and  con- 
sidered for  a  moment.  Duprez  had  come  to, 
quickly  after  receiving  the  blow,  and  had  made  off 
the  moment  he  was  able  to  do  so. 

Randall  hurried  onward  toward  the  woodpile 
where  he  had  left  Triton,  bound  and  gagged. 

But  Triton  had  also  disappeared.  The  bonds 
that  had  held  him,  severed  by  the  sharp  blade  of 
a  knife,  were  there.  Triton,  himself,  could  not 
have  cut  them,  therefore  Duprez  had  come  upon 
him,  had  liberated  him,  and  the  two  had  made  off 
together. 

Dan  did  not  care.  He  was  rather  pleased  than 
otherwise.  They  would  take  the  news  back  to 
their  camp,  of  the  capture  of  Taggart  and  Cuth- 
bert. 

Randall  hastened  back  again  to  the  stone  house. 

Jules,  aided  by  Yvonne,  had  bound  the  two  cap- 
tives, securely,  and  left  them  where  they  were, 
while  he  attended  to  Pitou.  For  the  bullet  that 
Cuthbert  had  fired  at  Jules  had  missed  its  mark, 
but  it  had  found  another  target  in  the  body  of  the 
old  man  who  had  been  standing  in  the  way  of  it. 

Yvonne  was  seated  on  the  floor  inside  the  house, 
holding  Pitou 's  head  on  her  lap,  and  was  stroking 
his  forehead  gently  while  she  murmured  reassur- 
ring  words  to  him,  when  Dan  got  there.  Jules 
was  standing  near,  looking  down  upon  them  both, 
sorrow  in  his  kind  eyes. 


314  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"C'est  fini,  m'sieu,"  he  said,  in  a  low  tone  to 
his  master.  "Eet  ees  the  end.  Heem  want  spik 
to  you,  m'sieu." 

Dan  dropped  upon  one  knee  beside  the  dying 
man,  and  Pitou  opened  his  eyes  weakly  and  smiled 
up  at  him. 

1  'Merci,  m'sieu,"  the  old  man  murmured.  "Eet 
ees  la  mort,  for  moi.  Dat  bullet,  heem  fin'  the 
right  place.  Heem  not  meant  for  Jules.  I  go, 
now— ver'  queek.  Le  bon  Dieu,  Heem  know  best. 
You  weel  listen  to  one  little  word  that  Pitou  have 
to  say?" 

"Yes,  yes,  Pitou.    What  is  it?"  Dan  replied. 

"Dat  Lightfoot,  heem  tres  mauvais,  m'sieu. 
Heem  ver' bad  man.  Non?" 

"Yes,  yes.    What  about  him,  Pitou?" 

"Heem  pere,  my  half  brothair.  Heem— dat 
Lightfoot— what  you  call  nephew  to  me.  I  theenk 
I  know  where  heem  hide  away  heemself.  Jules 
heem  know  the  place  I  mean.  Dat  ees  the  only 
place  where  heem  can  hide  heemself.  .  .  .  You, 
Jules,  bend  down  nearer  to  moi.  .  .  .  Merci. .  .  . 
You  know  the  place.  We  call  heem  the  black  rock. 
You  remember?" 

"Oui,  Pitou,"  Jules  replied. 

"Eet  ees  dere.  You  know.  Down  in  the  beeg 
hole,  behin'  eet.  You  hav'  not  been  dere.  I  have 
ben  dere  many  times.  You  go  dere.  You  follow 
down  that  bad  place  behin'  dat  rock,  an'  bimeby 
you  comme  to  where  I  theenk  dat  Lightfoot  hide 
heemself.  An'  mabby  heem  hav'  the  ma'm'selle 
hide  away  dere,  too." 

After  that  old  Pitou 's  talk  became  incoherent. 
Presently  he  lapsed  into  unconsciousness.  Then 


TAKING  THE  BULL  BY  THE  HORNS   315 

he  died,  and  with  his  old  head  in  Yvonne's  lap, 
and  her  fingers  gently  stroking  his  brows. 

Dan  and  Jules  carried  the  two  prisoners  into  the 
house.  Both  had  recovered  consciousness.  Cuth- 
bert  was  profane  and  abusive.  Taggart  was  silent 
until  they  attempted  to  lift  him  from  the  ground. 
Then  he  cried  out  with  pain,  and  fainted  away 
again,  and  Randall  realized  that  his  enemy  was 
badly  hurt. 

That  crashing  fall  upon  the  hard  ground,  when 
Dan  lifted  and  threw  him  in  their  struggle,  had 
done  more  damage  than  Taggart  had  ever  received 
before  that.  When  he  came  to,  on  the  cot  where 
he  had  been  placed,  he  asked  for  Dan. 

''I'm  all  in,  Randall,"  he  said,  rather  weakly, 
but  brusquely,  none  the  less,  and  with  all  of  his 
old  air  of  bravado.  "Something  snapped,  when 
you  dropped  me,  out  there.  I'm  all  right  as  long 
as  I  don't  try  to  move;  but  then— well,  I  can't 
move  a  finger  without  it's  half  killin'  me,  that's 
all." 

The  bonds  had  already  been  removed  from  his 
hands  and  feet.  Dan  had  quickly  made  up  his 
mind  that  Taggart  was  helpless— for  the  time 
being,  if  not  permanently.  His  spine  had  been  in- 
jured by  the  fall.  The  man  was  all  but  paralyzed. 

Not  so  with  Cuthbert,  however. 

He  ramped,  and  raved,  and  swore  so  loudly  and 
constantly,  that  Dan  very  quickly  determined  what 
he  would  do  with  him;  but,  for  the  present,  he 
and  Jules  carried  Cuthbert  into  one  of  the  back 
rooms  and  left  him  there.  Then  he  summoned 
Yvonne  and  Jules  to  him,  in  the  presence  of  Tag- 
gart. 


316  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"I've  got  a  few  things  to  say  to  my  people,  Tag- 
gart, and  I  want  you  to  hear  it,"  he  began.  "I 
can't  stay  here.  I  must  go.  I  must  go  now.  They 
need  me  back  there,  in  the  pass." 

He  turned,  then,  to  Jules  and  Yvonne. 

"I  shall  take  Cuthbert  with  me,"  he  continued. 
"I  shall  leave  Taggart  here  with  you.  It  may  be 
that  he  is  faking;  I  don't  know.  If  he  is,  Jules, 
and  if  he  should  make  the  least  effort  to  escape, 
shoot  him.  I  mean  what  I  say.  Understand?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"And  you,  Taggart?" 

"Oh,  I  understand,  all  right.  But  I'm  not 
fakin'.  That's  straight.  I  can  be  just  as  straight 
as  you  can,  when  I  want-a  be;  an'  I  seem  to  want-a 
be,  just  now." 

"  All  right.  We'll  let  it  go  at  that.  Out  there 
I  knocked  out  both  Triton  and  Duprez.  But  they 
escaped.  They  have  probably  gone  back  to  your 
camp.  Before  long  they  will  bring  a  hundred  or 
so  of  your  men  to  this  place.  Those  men  will 
bring  dynamite  with  them,  to  use  as  you  intended 
to  use  it.  If  they  do  that,  they  won't  try  to  blow 
up  the  house  itself;  they  will  put  their  charges 
against  that  front  door— just  as  you  would  have 
done  if  I  hadn't  been  here  to  stop  you." 

"I  know.  You're  right  about  that,  too.  I 
wanted  to  get  in  here." 

Dan  turned  again  to  Jules. 

"Jules,  we  will  move  this  cot,  now,  directly 
across  that  door.  If  anybody  tries  to  blow  it  in, 
with  dynamite,  they'll  blow  Taggart  to  pieces 
when  they  do  it.  Now,  Ben." 

"I  hear  you,  Dan  Randall." 


TAKING  THE  BULL  BY  THE  HORNS       317 

"It's  up  to  you  to  stop  your  outfit  from  using 
explosives— and  they  cannot  get  in  here  to  rescue 
you  without  it.  Jules  and  Yvonne  will  remain 
here  to  take  care  of  you— but  you've  got  to  save 
them,  and  this  house,  if  they  do.  Got  that?" 

"Surest  thing  you  know,  Randall.  I'll  have 
Yvonne  sing  out  to  them  to  send  somebody  inside, 
unarmed,  to  see  me.  Jules  can  keep  him  covered 
while  he's  here.  See?" 

"Yes." 

"  I  '11  fix  the  rest  of  it.    You  can  depend  on  that. ' ' 

"If  you  do  not,  Jules  will  fix  you,  Taggart. 
Don't  forget,  that  if  anything  happens,  you  will 
be  the  first  dead  man.  Get  me?" 

"Oh,  I'm  on.  I  ain't  sure  but  what  I'm  inclined 
to  take  your  side  of  things,  from  this  out.  You 
look  to  me  like  a  winner,  Dan." 

' ' That's  kind  of  you,  I 'm  sure.  Only,  I  wouldn't 
have  you  on  my  side— not  if  you  could  lift  your 
right  hand  and  have  the  whole  thing  finished  be- 
fore you  dropped  it  to  your  side  again.  Now; 
we  have  settled  that  much." 

"Yes." 

"There  are  two  or  three  questions  that  I  want 
to  ask  you,  Taggart." 

"Fire  away." 

"I  haven't  much  confidence  in  your  ability  to 
tell  the  truth  under  any  circumstances,  but  if  you 
tell  it  now,  you  may  find  it  greatly  to  your  advan- 
tage, later  on." 

"Chuck  it  at  me.  I'll  tell  the  truth  if  I  sayi 
anything.  A  man  with  a  busted  back  ain't  much 
account,  nohow." 

"Do  you  know  where^  Joyce  Maitland  is?" 


318  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"No  more'n  you  do,  Dan,  an'  that's  God's 
truth." 

"Do  you  know  where  Lightfoot  it?" 

"No  more'n  I  know  where  she  is." 

"Have  you  seen  him,  or  heard  from  him,  since 
you  sent  him  out  of  Magician  to  get  that  satchel  of 
mine?" 

"Narry  a  hide  nor  hair  of  him,  Dan,  so  help 
me!" 

"Have  you  any  idea  where  he  might  be  found?" 

"No  more'n  you  have;  honest." 

"You  don't  know  what  was  in  that  bag,  da 
you?" 

"Nope.    But  I  can  guess  at  it.    Money." 

"Well,  you  can  keep  on  guessing.  Maybe  you'll 
make  a  better  one." 

"I  don't  think  so." 

Dan  turned  away  and  drew  his  two  friends  after 
him  into  an  adjoining  room.  He  closed  the  door, 
carefully.  Then  he  spoke  in  a  low  tone. 

"Jules,"  he  said,  "do  you  know  where  and  what 
the  place  is  that  old  Pitou  spoke  about,  and  do 
you  think  that  there  is  any  likelihood  that  Light- 
foot  might  be  there?  Tell  me  exactly  what  you 
do  think  about  it." 

"Oui.  I  know  the  place,  m'sieu;  an'  I  theenk 
mabby-so,  what  you  say— dat  Lightfoot  ees  dere." 

"Where  is  it?" 

"Up  in  the  mountains,  then  down  inside  of  'em, 
ver'  far.  'Bout  half  way  between  the  pass,  an' 
Rickett's  canyon.  Fifteen  mile,  mabby-so.  But, 
heem  bad  place  to  fin'." 

"Then,  listen  to  me.  If  mam'selle  Joyce  is1 
there,  and  was  safe  yesterday,  and  last  week,  and 


TAKING  THE  BULL  BY  THE  HORNS       319 

for  the  two  weeks  preceding,  she  will  still  be  safe 
for  to-day  and  to-morrow.  You  wait  here  for  me 
until  the  day  after  to-morrow.  Then  I  will  come 
here,  and  we  will  go  to  that  place  together." 

Yvonne  interrupted. 

"But,  m'sieu,  in  the  meantime "  she  began, 

but  Randall  stopped  her  with  a  gesture. 

"In  the  meantime,  little  one,"  he  said,  "I  shall 
take  the  war  into  my  own  hands.  I  am  going  back 
now  to  get  my  men  together.  I  shall  take  them 
outside,  at  both  ends  of  the  pass,  first  one  end  and 
then  the  other.  I  am  going  to  drive  Taggart's 
men  at  this  end,  and  Wadleigh's  men  at  the  other 
end,  to— to  what  Taggart  would  call  Hell-an-gone. 
I'm  not  going  to  wait  any  more  for  them  to  attack 
me;  I  shall  do  a  little  attacking  on  my  own  ac- 
count. ...  I  will  be  back  here,  day  after  to- 
morrow, if  not  before,  so  be  on  the  lookout  for 
me." 


CHAPTER  XXXVIII 

When  Taggart  Laid  Down 

Dan  Randall  had  been  gone  from  the  stone  house 
less  than  an  hour  (haying  taken  Ellery  Cuthbert 
with  him;  Cuthbert  with  his  hands  bound  behind 
his  back,  and  forced  to  march  ahead  of  his  cap- 
tor) when  Taggart 's  men  appeared  in  a  body,  in 
the  clearing  before  the  house.  Dan  had  been  de- 
layed somewhat  by  the  disposal  of  all  that  re- 
mained of  poor  old  Pitou.  Masses  would  have  to 
be  said  for  him  later.  The  prayers  of  Yvonne  had 
to  suffice  for  the  present;  but  no  dead  man  could 
have  had  the  beseechings  of  a  gentler  or  purer  soul 
than  hers. 

The  men  formed  in  front  of  the  house,  and  Orme 
Crosby  called  out  a  summons.  Jules  replied  from 
the  hole  in  the  cliff  above  the  house-front. 

He  told  Crosby,  in  his  mixed  dialect,  but  never- 
theless quite  plainly,  what  the  situation  was,  and 
what  would  happen  to  Taggart  if  explosives  were 
used,  as  Crosby  threatened.  The  result  of  it  was 
that  after  a  parley,  and  some  hesitation,  Crosby 
laid  aside  his  weapons,  and  entered  the  house 
himself. 

Jules  kept  him  "covered"  during  every  moment 
of  the  time  he  remained. 

Crosby  stood  beside  Taggart 's  cot,  which  had 


WHEN  TAGGART  LAID  DOWN        321 

been  moved  against  the  inner  side  of  the  door,  as 
Dan  had  directed. 

"What's  the  matter  with  you,  Ben?"  he  de- 
manded. 

"My  back's  the  matter.  'Tain't  broken,  but  it 
might  as  well  be.  It's  busted  up,  somehow.  May- 
be I'll  pull  out;  I  don't  know.  I  feel  all  right 
enough,  if  I  keep  still.  Say,  Crosby." 

"Well?" 

"I've  been  thinkin'  this  thing  over.  Mebby 
it's  'cause  I'm  helpless,  an'  down  an'  out;  I  dunno. 
Mebby  if  I  had  my  feet  under  me,  an'  my  two  arms 
workin'  for  me,  I'd  be  just  as  hell-bent  for  coppin' 
out  this  thing  to  a  show-down  as  I  ever  was.  I 
dunno.  I  ain't  the  man  I  was,  in  my  heart  an' 
head,  any  more'n  I  am  in  my  arms  an'  legs.  An' 
so  I've  been  thinkin'  that  mebby  we'd  better  lay 
down  our  hands  and  let  Dan  rake  in  th'  pot." 

"I  never  expected  to  find  you  a  quitter,  Ben," 
Crosby  replied. 

' ' I  aint '  one.  But  I ' ve  got  sense  enough  to  know 
when  I'm  licked." 

"Maybe  you're  licked;  but  I  ain't.  Where's  El 
Cuthbert?" 

"He's  licked,  too.  An'  if  I  can  read  signs  as 
well's  I  used  to,  Ace  Wadleigh'll  join  th'  down- 
'n-outers  before  he's  three  days  older  than  he  is 
now.  It's  up  to  you  'n  me,  to  git  down  on  our 
marrers,  an'  beg,  Orme.  You  hear  me?" 

"Maybe  it's  up  to  you,  but  it  ain't  up  to  me.  I 
ain't  one  of  the  beggin'  kind?" 

"Ain't  you?  Well,  w^at  ^ave  vou  £ot  to  stand 
pat  on?  Not  a  thing.  Them  old  deeds  was  burned 
up,  in  Buxton's  store;  you  know  that.  I  had  th' 


322  UP  AGAINST  IT 

others,  that  Gaffney  made  out— and  I  lost  'em,  'r 
somebody  stole  'em.  It's  all  one,  so  long  's  they're 
gone.  You  give  Randall  time  an'  he'll  find  a  way 
to  prove  that  the  pass  is  his'n.  He  ain't  no  dam- 
fool,  Randall  ain't.  We  was  the  damfools  when 
we  played  him  for  one.  I'm  ready  to  testify  f'r 
him,  now,  if  it  comes  to  a  testify." " 

"You  dam'  traitor!"  Crosby  half  shouted  at 
him. 

' '  Uh,  huh, ' '  Taggart  responded,  placidly.  ' '  You 
can  call  me  them  things,  now.  You  wouldn't-a 
been  so  spry  about  it,  yesterday,  mebby.  But  that 
ain't  the  point." 

"What  is  the  point,  then?" 

"The  point  is  this,  Orme:  We  want  to  save  our 
bacon,  don't  we?  Dan's  got  us  flat  broke  if  we 
don't  lay  down,  an*  if  we  don't  do  it  now.  I've 
heard  our  men  grumblin'.  They'd  desert,  an'  go 
to  him  in  a  holy  minute,  if  they  had  a  chance,  an' 
you  know  it.  An'  you  can't  hold  'em  without  me. 
I'm  the  only  man  that  can  hold  'em,  an'  I  ain't 
goin'  to  try.  That's  flat." 

"Huh!  I'm  more  than  half  inclined  to  go  back 
outside,  right  now,  and  put  a  shot  of  dynamite 
against  that  door,  while  you're  behind  it,  you  low 
down,  sneakin' " 

"Hold  on,  Orme.  You  might  a  heap  sight  better 
go  outside  and  tie  yourself  to  a  tree,  an'  then  hire 
Duprez  to  build  a  fire  under  you,  than  do  that. 
Why,  if  you  done  that,  Crosby,  Dan  Randall  would 
—I  dunno  what  he  wouldn't  do  to  you.  Go  'head 
an'  try  it  if  you  want-a.  But  don't  you  call  me 
any  more  names,  'cause  if  you  do,  I'll  tell  Jules  to 
plug  you.  An'  Jules'  fingers  is  just  itchin'  to  do  it, 


WHEN  TAGGART  LAID  DOWN        323 

right  now.  .  .  .  Turn  him  out,  Jules,  before  I 
order  you  to  shoot  him.  Maybe  he'll  blow  up  the 
place,  but  I  don't  think  so.  He  ain't  got  sand 
enough.  .  .  .  Git  out,  Crosby.  You're  rotten." 

"Say!"  he  went  on,  after  a  moment,  when 
Crosby  made  no  reply.  "What  are  you  fightin' 
for,  anyhow?  What  are  you  goin'  to  git,  if  you 
could  win?  Do  you  suppose  that  old  Gregory  is 
goin'  to  let  you  an'  me  have  a  slice  of  this  thing, 
once  he  gets  his  own  paws  clinched  onto  it?  Not 
much  he  ain't!  An'  Ace  Wadleigh!  Where '11  he 
be  at?" 

"That's  what  I  want  to  know.  He's  no  quit- 
ter. He's " 

"He's  a  skunk;  that's  what  he  is.  If  it  hadn't 
been  for  him,  you  'n  me,  'n  El  Cuthbert  would-a 
stuck  to  Dan.  Where '11  the  M.  &  J.  be  when  Dan 
gits  this  Cut-off  to  goin'?  Tell  me  that.  I 
wouldn't  give  fifteen  cents  f 'r  the  hull  line  of  it, 
except  the  Carrolton  division.  Take  it  from  me, 
Orme,  Dan  Randall's  got  things  up  his  sleeve  that 
he  ain't  showed  us  yet.  He's  got  the  cards  stacked 
an'  we're  the  suckers,  from  Suckersville.  You'd 
better  hedge  on  this  deal,  while  there's  time." 

"How?" 

"How!  Go  out  there  an'  march  them  gazaboes 
back  to  the  camp.  Then  take  a  white  flag  in  y'r 
paw  an'  go  up  to  th'  captain's  office  an'  ask  f'r 
a  confab  with  Buxton.  Tell  him  that  you'n  me 
have  decided  to  chuck  up  th'  sponge,  an'  that  we'll 
turn  our  hull  outfit  over  to  Dan,  an'  no  questions 
asked.  Tell  him  to  tell  Dan  that  we'll  accept  any 
offer  that  Dan '11  make  to  us.  Bul-lieve  me  you'll 
git  a  heap  sight  better  terms  that  way  than  any 


324  UP  AGAINST  IT 

other.  Tell  him  that  you'll  go  through  the  pass, 
an'  help  him  to  lick  the  tar  out-a  Ace,  an'  his 
bunch,  an'  ole  Gregory,  an'  hisn." 

" Perhaps  the  men  won't  stand  for  such  a 
thing." 

"Won't  they?  Ask  em'.  Put  it  up  to  'em  if 
you  want  to.  Put  it  to  a  vote.  You'll  find  that 
they'll  go  over  to  Dan  Randall  with  a  cheer  that'll 
make  these  mountains  shake.  An'  say!" 

"Well?" 

"How  long  do  you  s'pose  it'll  take  Dan  to  finish 
that  job  if  he  has  our  outfit— an'  mebby  Ace's,  too 
—to  help  it  along?  Why,  man  alive,  he'll  have 
trains  runnin'  over  Magician  pass  before  the  sea- 
son's well  begun." 

"But,  what  will  we  get  out  of  it?  You  an'  me, 
an'  Cuthbert?" 

"We'll  git  whatever  Dan's  inclined  to  give  us. 
That  much,  an'  no  more." 

"It'll  be  the  icy  fist,  then." 

"No,  't  won't.  It'll  be  pretty  close  to  what  we 
ought  to  have,  take  it  from  me.  I  know  Dan  Ran- 
dall. He's  as  soft  as  a  girl,  if  you  touch  him  in 
the  right  spot." 

"You  mean  that  we  must  just  lay  down,  and  roll 
over  and  beg.  That's  what  you  mean,  Ben?" 

"That's  just  exactly  what  I  do  mean.  We  ain't 
got  a  leg  to  stand  on;  an'  if  we  wait  till  Dan  gits 
through,  there  won't  be  a  piece  of  sod  to  put  the 
leg  onto  if  we  had  it.  That's  what.  Cuthbert 's 
out-a  business;  I'm  out-a  business;  you're  out-a 
business  without  us;  Wadleigh  is  plumb  out-a 
business  without  any  of  us  to  stand  by  him— an' 
there  you  are.  Then,  there's  another  thing.  That 


WHEN  TAGGART  LAID  DOWN        325 

Gaffney  job  ain't  any  too  sweet-smellin'  to  suit  me. 
Them  forged  deeds,  if  they  should  turn  up,  spell 
stripes  an'  bars  for  some  of  us.  ...  You  give  Dan 
Randall  back  the  pass,  an'  then  tell  him  the  truth 
about  that  directors'  meetin',  and  the  girl,  anr 
you'll  find  that  you've  touched  that  right  spot  I 
was  talkin'  about.  What  d'ye  Bay,  Orme?  Is  it  a 
go?" 

Crosby  was  silent.  Then  he  nodded  his  head, 
slowly,  three  times.  Then  he  turned  about,  and, 
without  a  spoken  word  more,  passed  outside. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

The  Last  Ditch. 

Jules,  watching  closely  every  move  that  Crosby 
made  after  he  left  the  house,  saw  him  call  the  men 
around  him.  Jules  could  not  hear  what  was  said, 
but  within  ten  minutes  after  that,  Crosby's  men 
marched  away  again  as  swiftly  as  they  had  come; 
and  there  was  something  about  the  manner  of  their 
going— a  certain  jauntiness  that  had  not  been  with 
them  upon  their  arrival— which  told  the  quick- 
witted Jules  that  they  were  more  pleased  than  dis- 
appointed to  go. 

He  so  reported  to  Taggart;  and  for  a  few  mo- 
ments afterward  Taggart  was  thoughtful.  Then 
he  called  Jules  to  him  again. 

"Look  here,  Jules,"  he  said.  "You  ain't  got 
any  too  much  reason  to  trust  me,  have  you?  You 
ain't  liked  me  very  sumptuous,  in  the  past,  have 
you?" 

"Non,  m'sieu,"  was  the  placid  reply. 

"Well,  I've  got  a  suggestion  to  make  to  you, 
anyhow." 

"Tres-bien,  m'sieu." 

"I  want  you  to  light  out-a  here  on  the  trail  of 
Dan  Randall.  Catch  him  if  you  can.  Anyhow 
git  to  the  pass,  an'  git  into  it  somehow— I  suspect 
that  you  know  how  to  do  it  all  right— as  quick  as 
the  Lord'll  let  you.  See?" 


THE  LAST  DITCH  327 

"I  see,  m'sieu." 

"But  you  don't  feel  like  goin*  an*  leavin* 
Yvonne  here,  alone  with  me.  I  don't  blame  you 
any  for  feelin'  that  way,  an'  I'm  comin'  to  that, 
presently." 

Jules  nodded,  studying  the  man  with  close  scru- 
tiny. 

"You  heard  all  that  was  said  between  Crosby 
an'  me,  didn't  you,  Jules?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"Well,  all  that  I  want  you  to  do  is  to  tell  Dan 
Randall  all  that  you  heard,  and  all  that  you 
thought  about  it,  just  as  soon  as  it  can  be  done. 
See?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"Tell  him  that  there  ain't  no  strings  tied  to  it 
—or  to  me,  either.  Tell  him  that  I'm  just  layin' 
down  my  hand  an'  gittin'  up  from  the  table,  an' 
pullin'  out-a  the  game.  An'  tell  him  that  if  he 
wants  to  stake  me  to  a  bank-roll,  so's  I  can  set  in 
agin,  I'm  ready  to  accept  it,  an'  to  play  accordin' 
to  the  rules  that  he  recognizes.  Have  you  got  that 
much  all  clear  in  your  mind,  Jules?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"Oh,  don't  be  so  dam  polite.  It  ain't  necessary. 
Now,  as  to  the  other  thing  I  was  goin'  to  say.  I 
can't  move.  I'm  as  helpless  as  a  baby -calf  that 
ain't  found  its  legs  yet.  But  all  the  same,  mebby 
you  don't  believe  that.  Mebby  you  think  I'm 
puttin'-on,  an'  that  me  'n  Crosby  had  some 
sort  of  a  secret  understandin'  in  that  confab  of 
ourn.  We  didn't,  but  you  ain't  sure  that  we 
didn't.  Well,  I'm  going  to  tell  you  how  to  make 
sure." 


328  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 

"You  just  tie  me  up,  hoof  an'  horns,  as  tight 
as  you  want-a,  before  you  go.  Then  you  give 
Yvonne  a  gun,  an'  tell  her  to  set  right  down  there 
till  you  come  back,  an'  if  she  sees  the  slightest 
thing,  inside  the  house  or  out  of  it,  that  suggests 
to  her  that  I  ain't  playin'  on  the  level,  to  shoot  me. 
How's  that?" 

Jules  nodded.  He  turned  to  Yvonne,  who  was 
standing  near,  and  she  nodded,  also.  Her  eyes 
had  been  drilling  into  Taggart's  very  soul  while 
he  was  talking. 

"M'sieu  Taggart  mean  what  he  say,"  she  said, 
soberly.  "He  spik  the  truth,  now.  You  go,  Jules. 
You  need  not  tie  m'sieu." 

Ten  seconds  later  Jules  had  left  the  house. 

He  did  not  overtake  Dan,  but  he  came  upon 
Miron's  men  within  half  an  hour  after  Dan  had 
passed  them,  for,  with  the  prisoner,  Dan  did  not 
make  very  great  speed.  Miron  knew  Jules,  and 
passed  him  on  readily. 

Randall  and  Buxton  were  together  when  Jules 
found  them,  at  the  pulpit.  Buxton  had  just  fin- 
ished making  his  report  concerning  affairs  at  the 
east  end  of  the  pass  that  morning. 

In  effect  they  were  about  the  same  as  the  ex- 
periences that  Dan  had  met  with,  only  that  no  pris- 
oners had  been  taken.  Wadleigh's  men  had  been 
driven  back.  Seven  men  of  Wadleigh's  forces  had 
taken  the  opportunity  to  desert,  and  come  over  to 
Buxton  and  Dan;  and  those  men  reported  that 
Wadleigh  had  met  with  an  accident  of  some  sort, 
but  whether  it  was  serious  or  not  they  did  not 
know. 


THE  LAST  DITCH  329 

Their  report  was,  however,  unconfirmed.  There 
was  no  telling  whether  it  was  true  or  not. 

The  one  noticeable  thing  about  conditions  in 
the  pass  was  that  work  had  not  been  halted  in  the 
least  degree.  Drills  were  hammering,  dynamos 
were  humming,  iron  was  ringing  upon  iron,  just 
as  merrily  as  ever. 

The  Janver  Cut-off  was  going  forward  just  as 
rapidly  as  before. 

Dan  listened  to  what  Jules  had  to  say,  with  in- 
credulous amazement,  at  first;  then  with  interest. 
And  confirmation  of  the  truth  of  it  came  almost  at 
the  moment  that  Jules  finished. 

A  messenger  arrived  from  the  west  end  of  the 
pass. 

"Three  men  have  come  forward,  down  below," 
he  told  Dan."  They  brought  a  white  flag,  so  we 
talked  with  them.  One  was  Crosby.  He  says  he 
wants  to  see  Mr.  Buxton,  or  you,  sir,  or  both  of 
you  together." 

It  was  two  o'clock  in  the  afternoon  when  Crosby 
and  the  two  men  he  brought  with  him  were  admit- 
ted to  the  inclosure  behind  the  fort  at  the  west  end 
of  the  pass. 

Jules  was  stationed  where  he  could  hear  all  that 
Crosby  might  have  to  say,  but  where  he  could  not 
be  seen. 

But  Dan  could  see  Jules  by  turning  his  glance 
from  time  to  time  during  the  conference,  and 
Jules'  frequent  nods  of  his  head  were  sufficient 
assurance  that  Crosby  was  telling  substantially  the 
truth. 

It  was  nearly  dark  by  the  time  that  all  of  the 


330  UP  AGAINST  IT 

men  who  had  gathered  at  the  mouth  of  the  pass, 
under  the  command  of  Taggart,  Cuthbert  and 
Crosby,  had  been  signed  on,  and  had  been  divided 
into  groups  and  squads  and  gangs,  at  the  direc- 
tion of  Randall,  and  were  marched  through  the 
pass  to  their  several  stations. 

So  ended  one  phase  of  the  fight  for  possession 
of  Magician  pass. 

Dan  knew  that  he  would  have  nothing  more  to 
fear  at  the  Janver  end  of  it.  He  had  the  signed 
confession,  properly  witnessed,  of  Crosby,  relative 
to  the  forged  deeds,  and  to  the  part  that  Peteit 
Gaffney  had  played  in  it. 

But  Crosby  had  made  no  mention  of  the  name  of 
Joyce  Maitland. 

Dan,  from  motives  best  understood  by  himself, 
alone,  had  avoided  any  mention  of  her.  Jules  had 
forgotten,  or  neglected,  or  determined  not  to  speak 
of  the  one  remark  he  had  heard  Taggart  make  in 
reference  to  Joyce. 

Cuthbert,  still  a  prisoner  under  guard,  sore  to 
the  quick,  ugly,  resentful,  and  as  bitter  as  gall, 
had  refused  to  take  any  part  in  the  confession,  and 
had  cursed  Crosby,  and  Taggart,  and  Dan  and 
everybody  connected  with  the  affair  except  Ace 
Wadleigh,  roundly. 

"Ace  Wadleigh  an'  me,  ain't  through,  yet!"  he 
yelled  at  them.  "Gregory  ain't  through,  either. 
You'll  see.  I'll  swear  till  I'm  black  in  the  face 
that  that  confession  of  Crosby's  is  a  lie  from  be- 
ginnin'  to  end.  So '11  Wadleigh.  So  will  about  a 
hundred  more  of  us." 

Dan  preferred  not  to  argue  with  him,  and  left 
him;  but  Dan  Randall  knew  Ace  Wadleigh  better, 


THE  LAST  DITCH  331 

perhaps,  than  any  of  them  did,  and  he  realized  that 
Cuthbert  had  spoken  the  literal  truth  so  far  as  he 
was  concerned. 

Ace  was  not  one  to  give  up.  He  would  fight  to 
the  last  ditch.  The  contest  for  the  possession  of 
the  pass  was  not  over,  yet.  Dan  realized  that. 

His  decision  in  that  regard  was  confirmed  in  a 
startling  manner  within  thirty  seconds  from  the 
time  of  his  parting  with  Cuthbert. 

He  stepped  outside  of  the  shack  where  Cuthbert 
was  confined,  and  closed  the  door  of  it  after  him. 
Buxton,  and  Crosby,  and  three  of  his  foremen, 
were  with  him. 

He  came  to  a  stop  a  few  yards  from  the  door, 
and  parted  his  lips  to  make  some  remark  concern- 
ing what  had  just  occurred,  when  all  of  them  were 
startled  by  the  sullen  roar  made  by  a  succession  of 
explosions  which  came  from  down  the  pass  to  the 
east  of  them. 

Every  man  there  knew  what  it  meant.  There 
was  no  mistaking  the  sounds  of  it.  Wadleigh  was 
making  an  attack,  and  he  was  using  dynamite. 

Wadleigh  was  endeavoring  to  blow  up  the  fort 
that  guarded  the  eastern  entrance  to  Magician 
pass.  Possibly  he  believed  that  Taggart  would  be 
doing  the  same  thing  at  the  opposite  end— or  he 
had  determined  to  go  it  alone,  in  any  event. 

Dan  Randall  gave  his  orders  quickly. 

"Get  down  there,  Bux,"  he  shouted.  "Crosby, 
now  is  your  opportunity  to  prove  yourself.  Stay 
with  Buxton,  and  take  his  orders.  Bux,  order  out 
every  man  who  is  not  engaged  on  the  work.  No 
shooting!  No  killing  or  wounding,  if  it  can  be 
avoided.  Drive  Wadleigh  and  his  men  out. 


332  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Drive  them  into  Magician,  and  then  out  of  it  again. 
Keep  after  them.  Let  this  night  be  the  finish. 
I'll  be  with  you  by  the  time  you  get  at  it." 

Dan  ran  to  the  little  building  that  he  called  his 
headquarters. 

He  discovered,  there,  that  the  explosions  down 
below  must  have  been  even  worse  than  he  sup- 
posed. Neither  the  telephones,  nor  the  telegraph 
wires,  were  working. 

He  had  known  by  the  noise  of  them  that  the- 
shots  set  off  were  many,  as  well  as  violent.  He 
had  no  doubt,  now,  that  Wadleigh  had  somehow 
succeeded  in  planting  his  mines  so  that  the  whole 
front  of  the  east  fort  had  been  destroyed. 

In  his  dash  down  the  pass  toward  the  scene  of 
the  conflict  he  overtook  and  out-distanced  scores 
of  his  own  men  who  were  rushing  in  that  direction 
to  take  part  in  the  fight. 

Skinners,  with  their  mules  and  whips;  hard- 
rockers,  with  their  hammers,  sledges,  and  steel 
drills;  graders,  with  their  shovels  and  picks;  rail- 
ers,  with  their  sledges  and  spikes;  it  looked  as  if 
every  man  among  them  had  picked  up  the  first  ar- 
ticle he  could  lay  his  hands  upon  to  use  as  a 
weapon. 

For  a  time  they  needed  them,  too. 

It  turned  out  afterward  that  Wadleigh's  men 
had  been  ordered  to  shoot— and  many  of  them  did 
shoot  toward  the  defenders  of  the  pass,  with  Win- 
chesters and  revolvers;  but  they  shot  high,  pur- 
posely. 

It  went  on  record,  afterward,  that  not  one  man 
of  either  party  was  hit  by  a  bullet  that  night;  but 
the  broken  heads,  the  smashed  jaws,  the  torn 


THE  LAST  DITCH  333 

faces,  and  dislocated  bones  and  joints  that  resulted 
from  that  fight,  short  and  sharp  as  it  was,  were  too 
many  to  be  counted  definitely. 

Many  of  the  attacking  party  were  beaten  down 
by  the  hoofs  of  the  charging  mules  of  the  skinners. 
Many  more  sustained  cut  and  bleeding  faces  that 
were  laid  open,  often  to  the  bone,  by  the  terrible 
whip-lashes. 

There  were  hundreds  of  hand-to-hand  fights; 
scores  of  impromptu  wrestling  matches ;  dozens  of 
personal  contests  between  respective  bullies  who 
stripped  for  it,  and  around  whom  rings  were 
formed  to  abide  by  the  decision  of  that  particular 
fight,  and  to  enlist  their  further  efforts  on  the  side 
of  the  victor  of  it  at  the  end. 

But  the  utter  rout  which  followed,  as  the  result 
of  the  conflict,  was  inevitable. 

Wadleigh's  men  were  bested  at  every  turn. 

They  broke  and  fled  in  whole  sections  before 
the  fight  had  continued  twenty  minutes  after  the 
arrival  of  the  reinforcements  from  up  the  pass. 
In  twos,  and  tens,  and  sometimes  by  the  score, 
they  seized  upon  the  opportunity  to  go  over  to 
Dan's  side,  and  turned  about  to  fight  against  their 
own  numbers. 

Then  came  the  stampede  of  those  who  remained 
loyal  to  Wadleigh,  or  who  were  afraid  to  desert 
him. 

They  were  chased  into  the  open  ground  below 
the  entrance  to  the  pass;  they  were  pursued  into 
the  very  town  of  Magician.  Those  who  were 
overtaken  were  pummeled  until  they  yelled  for 
mercy— or  until  they  agreed  to  go  to  work  for  the 
Janver  Cut-off. 


334  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Captain  Badmington,  with  his  few  men,  rode 
out  to  the  scene  of  the  conflict— and  arrived  only 
in  time  to  discover  that  it  was  over  and  done 
with. 

In  the  beginning,  Wadleigh  led  his  hosts,  and 
shouted  encouragement  to  them  from  everywhere, 
seeming  to  be  omnipresent  in  his  capacities.  It 
was  certain  that  he  had  not  been  injured  so  that 
he  could  not  fight. 

At  the  end  of  it,  however,  Ace  Wadleigh  had 
disappeared. 

Search  for  him  as  they  might— and  did— not 
a  trace  of  him  could  be  found;  and  when,  at  least, 
comparative  quiet  had  been  restored,  when  the 
men  who  had  been  fighting  against  each  other  were 
laughing  together  and  retailing  accounts  of  the 
deeds  they  had  performed,  or  witnessed,  during 
the  mix-up,  Ace  Wadleigh  was  nowhere  to  be 
found. 

There  was  just  one  sad  fact  connected  with  the 
whole  affair. 

Those  first  explosions,  when  the  fort  was  blown 
up,  had  killed  three  men  outright,  and  a  dozen  oth- 
ers had  been  injured  more  or  less  severely.  In  the 
fight  that  followed  no  one  had  been  mortally  in- 
jured, although  there  were  scores  who  would  find 
themselves  temporarily  disabled. 

Where  was  Wadleigh? 

Nobody  seemed  able  to  supply  any  clue  about 
him  until  a  big  and  burly  Irishman  shouldered  his 
way  through  the  knot  of  men  who  surrounded 
Randall,  and  announced: 

"I  dunno  where  he  is  now,  sor,  but  the  last  I 
seed  av  him,  he  was  hot-footin'  it  f 'r  the  sky-line 


THE  LAST  DITCH  335 

toward  th*  north,  an'  there  was  a  breed-Injun  wid 
him  that  I  hadn't  seen  before." 

Dan  wondered  if  the  "breed-Injun"  could  have 
been  Lightfoot.    But  he  did  not  ask  the  question. 


CHAPTER  XL 
Things  That  Did  Not  Burn 

Dan  Randall,  with  Jules  beside  him,  rode  into 
Magician  that  same  night. 

He  went  directly  to  the  barracks,  and  to  Captain 
Badmington,  and  laid  Orme  Crosby's  signed  and 
witnessed  confession  before  that  official. 

Then  Jules  was  sworn,  and  related  all  that  he 
heard  said  between  Taggart  and  Crosby,  at  the 
stone  house  at  White  Lake.  And  the  memory  of 
Jules,  for  detail,  was-  prof ound. 

After  that,  Randall  took  the  oath  himself,  and 
told  his  own  story,  and  at  the*  end  of  it,  Captain 
Badmington  openedLa  drawer  of  his  desk  and  drew 
forth  from  it  two  packages,  wrapped  in.  oilskins. 
He  laid  them  both  down  on  the  desk  in  front  of 
him. 

"Mr.  Randall,"  he  said,  "these  two  packages 
have  been  in  my  possession  eversince  the  day  that 
Sergeant  Hurley  arrested  you  and  brought  you 
here  to  this  office.  I  have  examined  the  contents 
of  both  of  them." 

He  lifted  one  of  them  in  his  hands  and  removed 
the  wrappings.  Then  he  ran  the  documents  it 
had  contained  idly  through  his  fingers. 

"This  one,"  he  continued,  "you  have  believed 
was  burned  in  the  stove,  in  Buxton's  store.  In; 
reality,  when  you  tore  it  away  from  the  possession 


THINGS  THAT  DID  NOT  BURN      337 

of  Mr.  Wadleigh,  and  threw  it  over  your  head  be- 
hind you,  it  fell  directly  into  the  grasp  of  Mr.  Bux- 
ton. There  was  a  third  package  of  this  character, 
if  you  will  take  the  trouble  to  recall  the  fact,  in 
your  own  possession.  It  was  some  sort  of  a  fake- 
package,  I  believe,  that  Wadleigh  had  made  up, 
and  had  substituted  for  this  one,  before  you  left 
Janver  to  come  here.  There  was  such  a  fake- 
package,  was  there  not?" 

"Yes,  captain." 

"You  had  referred  to  it  in  your  talk  with  Bux- 
ton,  before  your  arrest.  You  were  very  cold,  and 
worn  out  by  your  exertions,  at  that  time.  In  re- 
turning it  to  your  pocket,  you  missed  the  pocket 
and  dropped  it  to  the  floor,  without  being  aware 
of  the  fact.  Your  fingers  were  half  frozen  at  the 
time.  Buxton  picked  it  up  and  laid  it  on  the  coun- 
ter behind  him.  Do  you  understand  me,  Mr.  Ran- 
dall?" 

"I  am  beginning  to,  captain." 

"When  this  package  here  was  thrown  into  Bux- 
ton's  hands,  he  put  it  into  one  of  his  pockets.  No- 
body noticed  the  fact.  You  were  keeping  things 
moving  at  about  that  time,  were  you  not?" 

"I  believe  I  was,  sir."  Randall  smiled  a  little  at 
the  recollection. 

"Buxton  remembered  the  package  that  you  had 
said  contained  nothing  but  waste  paper.  It  was 
on  the  counter,  within  his  reach.  He  seized  it,  and 
threw  it  into  the  fire.  You  know  the  rest  of  that 
story." 

"Yes,  sir.  It  is  rather  wonderful,  isn't  it?  All 
this,  I  mean?" 

"Perhaps.    It  was  certainly  fortunate  for  you. 


338  UP  AGAINST  IT 

Buxton  is  my  personal  friend,  as  possibly  you 
know.  He  lost  no  time  in  telling  me  all  the  de- 
tails, and  in  placing  the  old  deeds  in  my  hands.  I 
knew,  almost  at  once,  exactly  where  you  stood  in 
the  matter  relating  to  Magician  pass." 

"Thank  you,  captain." 

"Something  else  happened  there,  at  the  store, 
that  day.  It  relates  to  this  other  packet." 

"Yes,  sir?" 

"It  dropped  to  the  floor  during  your  fight  with 
'Jaggart.  He  dropped  it.  He  did  not  know  that 
he  had  done  so.  Neither  did  anybody  else  appear 
to  know  about  it.  It  was  seen  by  Sergeant  Hur- 
ley, who  picked  it  up.  ...  Now,  Sergeant  Hurley 
is  not  usually  forgetful,  but  he  forgot  all  about 
this  packet  for  some  days  after  that— until  he  ac- 
cidentally came  upon  it  again.  Then  he  brought 
it  to  me.  It  contains  the  forged  deeds." 

"Wonderful!"  Dan  murmured  in  an  undertone. 

"I  am  familiar  with  your  signature,  Mr.  Ran- 
dall. When  I  was  a  young  man  I  worked  in  a 
bank  and  I  rose  to  the  position  of  paying-teller.  I 
was  considered  an  expert  in  the  matter  of  signa- 
tures, and  forgeries  of  signatures.  I  do  not  need 
these  confessions  of  Taggart  and  Crosby  to  assure 
me  that  the  signatures  to  these  deeds  are  forged. ' ' 

"I  don't  know  how  to  express  my  thanks,  sir, 
for " 

"Never  mind  that,  Mr.  Randall.  Acting  upon 
my  advice,  Mr.  Buxton  kept  silent  in  regard  to  all 
that  I  have  told  you.  I  deemed  it  best  to  permit 
events  to  shape  themselves  somewhat  more  defi- 
nitely before  I  acted  in  your  behalf.  The  result 
has  proved  that  I  was  right." 


THINGS  THAT  DID  NOT  BURN       339 

"Indeed  it  has,  captain.    You  see " 

" Please  let  me  continue,  Mr.  Randall." 

* '  Certainly,  captain.    Excuse  me. " 

"I  did  take  it  upon  myself  to  have  something 
in  the  nature  of  a  warning  whispered  into  the  ear 
of  Mr.  Lionel  Gregory.  He  has  not  been  active  in 
your  affairs  since  I  did  that.  The  first  attack! 
upon  you  would  not  have  occurred  had  I  done  it  a 
few  hours  sooner.  And,  now,  there  is  just  one 
thing  more." 

"I  am  overwhelmed  as  it  is,"  Dan  replied. 

"Well,  this  clinches  matters,  I  believe.  The 
records  of  your  deeds  were  not  destroyed  that 
night  when  poor  Sutherland  was  burned  to  death. 
Those  particular  books  which  contained  them  hap- 
pened to  be  in  the  safe.  Your  title  to  the  right  of 
way  across  Magician  pass  seems  to  me  to  be  per- 
fectly clear,  Randall.  I  congratulate  you." 

"God  bless  you,  Captain  Badmington." 

"The  same  to  you,  sir,  and  thank  you.  God's 
blessing  is  the  one  great  thing  in  our  lives.  With- 
out it  we  can  do  little;  with  it,  we  may  accomplish 
much.  Good  night,  Mr.  Randall.  .  .  .  But  wait. 
What  information  have  you  concerning  the  where- 
abouts of  Boniface  Wadleigh?" 

"None  whatever,  save  that  he  escaped  from  us 
tonight,  and  was  last  seen,  bound  northward, 
along  the  eastern  slope  of  the  Lantowas  in  the) 
company  of  a  'breed '-Indian  who  might  have  been 
Lightfoot.  But  that  is  only  a  guess  of  mine." 

"Thank  you.  I  shall  issue  a  warrant,  and  a  re- 
ward for  his  apprehension,  in  the  morning.  It 
was  he  who  gave  the  order  for  the  use  of  those  ex- 
plosives, in  the  attack  of  to-night,  by  which  three 


340  UP  AGAINST  IT 

men  were  killed,  and  others  were»severely  injured. 
This  Dominion  will  nottcountenance  such  things 
as  that.  There  is  nothing*  more,»  I  believe." 

"Yes,  sir;  there  is  one  thing  more,"  Dan  said, 
impulsively.  "It  is  something  that.concerns. my- 
self, intimately.  It  is  something  that  you  should 
know,  concerning  me.  I*  am  not " 

The  captain  held  up  one  hand,  warningly,  and 
stopped  him. 

"All  in  good  time,  Mr.  Randall.  Perhaps  I 
know  what  you  would  speak  about;  possibly  I  do 
not.  In  any  case,  it  can  wait— and  I  much  prefer 
that  it  should.  I  will  say  this  much,  however." 

"Yes,  sir." 

"I  know  who  Peter  Gaffney  was,  and  what  he 
was  called  before  he  came  out  here.  I  also  know 
why  he  came  here— which  I  am  sure  you  do  not 
know.  If  your  communication  that  you  were 
about  to  make  has  any  reference  to  him,  or  to  the 
contents  of  the  belt  he  was  wearing  when  he  was 
frozen  to  death  on  the  mountain,  I  must  ask  you 
not  to  make  it  now.  There  will  be  a  more  ap- 
propriate time,  later  on.  ...  And  now,  Mr.  Ran- 
dall, I  will  shake  hands  with  you,  and  bid  you 
goodnight." 

Dan  Randall  stood  very  still  for  ten  minutes 
after  the  captain  had  gone.  Jules  and  Sergeant 
Hurley  remained  in  the  room,  waiting  in  silence. 
But  then  Jules  stepped  forward  and  touched  him 
tentatively  on  the  arm.  Randall  turned. 

"Thank  you,  Hurley,  for  all  that  you  have  done 
for  me, ' '  he  said.  ' '  Come,  Jules.  We  must  start  at 
once.  Ma'm'selle  is  somewhere  up  there  in  the 
mountains,  and  we  must  find  her." 


CHAPTER  XLI 
A  Cry  for  Help 

Jules,  ever  silent  unless  there  were  need  for 
words,  made  no  remark  until  they  were  almost  at 
the  entrance  to  the  pass.  But  he  knew  that  m'sieu 
had  not  spoken  idly  when  he  had  said:  '  'We  must 
start  at  once."  At  once,  with  Randall,  meant 
now;  but  all  the  same,  Jules  had  different  ideas. 

"M'sieu,"  he  said,  as  they  were  about  to  enter 
the  pass,  "do  you  mean  that  we  go  to-night,  for 
to  fin'  mam'selle?" 

"Yes,"  Dan  replied.  "At  once.  As  soon  as  I 
have  seen  Buxton,  to  tell  him  about  it." 

"But,  m'sieu  weel  listen  un  leetle  moment  to 
sommethang  w'at  Jules  hav'  to  say?  Non?" 

"Of  course,  Jules.    What  is  it?" 

"Thees:  Dat  groun',  heem  not  ver'  hard  when 
m'sieu  Wadleigh  go  'way  avec  dat  breed-man. 
Heem  not  ver'  hard  now,  jus'  sam.  You  under- 
stand, m'sieu?" 

"No.  You  mean  that  it  would  leave  some  sort 
of  a  trail?  Of  course.  I  had  not  thought  of 
that." 

"Non;  you  had  no  thought  of  dat,  m'sieu.  But, 
in  de  night,  we  not  see  dat  trail.  Een  le  matin, 
when  de  sun  shine,  we  see  heem  plain.  Non?" 

"Yes,  Jules.  I  understand  you.  We  will  wait 
until  it  is  light  before  we  start." 


342  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Merci,  m'sieu." 

"Do  you  think  that  you  will  be  able  to  find  and 
to  follow  their  trail,  Jules?" 

"For  sure,  m'sieu.  Certainment.  Pourquoi 
non?  Jus'  like  you  read  a  book.  But,  de  hardes' 
part  will  be  to  fin'  de  trail,  een  de  firs'  place.  An' 
so,  m'sieu,  when  eet  ees  light,  an'  you  wak'  up,  you 
fin'  Jules  gone  already.  But  Jules  be  lookin'  for 
dat  trail.  You  see,  m'sieu?" 

"Yes." 

"You  comme  then,  jus'  sam',  m'sieu.  Right  out 
dere,  where  Jules  point  heem  finger,  now.  You 
fin'  Jules  waitin'  for  you.  Then  we  go  on,  bien- 
tot— queek.  Non?" 

"All  right,  Jules,  I  understand.  You  will  be 
out  there  as  soon  as  dawn  begins  to  show,  and  by 
the  time  I  get  there  you  will  have  found  the  trail. 
Good.  That  is  better,  and  I  know  you  well  enough 
to  know  that  you  can  follow  the  trail  once  you  have 
discovered  it.  But,  wait  a  moment.  Tell  me 
what  you  think  of  it  all." 

"I  do  not  know  how  to  answer  dat,  m'sieu." 

"Was  it  Lightfoot,  do  you  think,  who  came  here 
to-night  to  get  Wadleigh?" 

"No.  I  not  know  why  I  theenk  not;  but  Jules 
theenk  not,  jus'  sam'.  But,  Jules  theenk  othair 
theeng,  m'sieu." 

"What  else?" 

"I  theenk  dat  Lightfoot  send  dat  man,  mabby- 
so.  Lightfoot  afraid  comme  heemself,  mabby-so, 
et  send  othair  man." 

It  was  not  long  after  daylight  the  following 
morning  when  Dan  Randall  found  Jules  waiting 
for  him,  half  a  mile  north  of  the  eastern  end  of 


A  CRY  FOR  HELP  343 

the  pass.  The  faithful  fellow  stood  up  quickly 
when  he  saw  Dan  approaching,  and  announced  as 
soon  as  he  was  near  enough: 

"I  fin'  dat  trail,  m'sieu.  Heem  not  ver'  plain, 
but  I  see  him  all  right,  jus'  sam'.  Dat  snake 
Lightf  oot,  heem  not  mak'  one  part  of  eet.  I  know 
who  mak'  dat  othair  trail.  Lightf  oot  hav'  one 
frien',  mabby-so." 

They  started  on  together  without  further  con- 
verse, and  several  miles  had  been  covered,  and 
they  had  begun  to  ascend  to  higher  levels  along 
one  of  the  mountain  ravines,  when  Jules  an- 
nounced, without  preface: 

"I  go  across  de  pass  las'  nuit,  m'sieu,  to  de 
stone  maison  by  de  lac.  Yvonne,  she  gone  from 
dere,  m'sieu.'* 

Dan  stopped  short  in  his  tracks. 

"Yvonne  gone?"  he  exclaimed.    "Where?" 

"Je  ne  sais  pas,  m'sieu,  unless  she  theenk  she 
fin'  ma'm'selle  Joie.  Yvonne  feel  ver'  bad  'bout 
mam'selle  Joie,  m'sieu.  I  theenk  she  go  to  fin* 
her,  mabby-so.  Triton— heem  m'sieu  Taggart's 
homme,  you  know— heem  not  een  dat  fight  las' 
nuit.  Heem  go  back  to  de  house.  So,  Yvonne, 
when  she  fin'  dat  Triton  ees  dere  to  tak'  care  of 
m'sieu  Taggart,  she  jus'  say  notting,  an'  what  you 
call,  light  out.  But  she  tak'  theengs  to,  eat  with 
her.  So  Jules  theenk  she  go  to  fin'  mam'selle. 
M'sieu  weel  remember  that  Yvonne  hear  all  that 
old  Pitou  said  about  dat  place  under  the  black 
rock?" 

"Yes." 

"M'sieu  theenk  heem  able  to  travel  jus'  leetle 
bit  faster?"  Jules  asked. 


344  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"  Three  times  faster  than  we  have  been  going, 
Jules,  if  you  will.  Go  just  as  fast  as  you  like.  I'll 
keep  up  with  you." 

It  was  a  big  promise,  as  Dan  soon  discovered, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  Jules  had  crossed 
the  pass  twice  during  the  preceding  night,  and  had 
had  no  sleep. 

Up  hill  and  down  dale,  over  rocks  and  through 
woods,  across  ravines  and  athwart  hog-back 
ridges,  up  precipitous  cliff -sides,  along  precarious 
ledges,  through  thickets  that  were  almost  impene- 
trable, they  made  their  way  onward. 

Sometimes  the  trail  was  plain  indeed;  at  other 
times  they  nearly  lost  it  utterly. 

There  were  occasions  when  Jules  lost  precious 
moments  seeking  it;  there  were  others  when  they 
ran  with  all  speed  along  level  places  where  the 
trail  could  be  plainly  followed. 

They  forded  icy  torrents  of  water  that  still  were 
fed  by  the  snows  that  lingered  at  higher  points 
above  them.  They  floundered  through  enormous 
drifts  of  snow  that  had  not  yet  succumbed  to  the 
thaws;  and  so,  at  last,  just  before  sundown,  they 
crossed  the  backbone  of  the  range,  and  stopped  for 
a  moment  upon  a  flat  space,  whence  there  was  an 
uninterrupted  view  in  nearly  all  directions. 

But,  when  Dan  would  have  stood  up  boldly  in 
order  to  look  about  him,  Jules  pulled  him  back- 
ward, below  the  highest  point  of  rocks. 

"We  mighty  clos'  to  dat  Black  Rock,  m'sieu," 
he  said.  "Mabby  dat  Lightfoot  be  on  de  watch. 
Heem  see  us,  then  heem  be  warned.  Non? ' ' 

"Is  it  so  near  as  that?"  Dan  asked,  eagerly. 

"Oui,  m'sieu." 


A  CRY  FOR  HELP  345 

"Then  why  don't  we  go  ahead?  What  is  the 
use  of  waiting  here?" 

"M'sieu  hav'  forgot,  mabby,  what  dat  captain 
say,  down  een  Magicienne?  Heem  say  dat  m'sieu 
Wadleigh  hav'  keel  three  men,  an'  purty  near  keel 
somme  othairs.  Non?  M'sieu  Wadleigh  know 
that.  Mabby-so,  now,  eef  you  stan'  up  dere  where 
he  can  see  you,  heem  shoot  you.  Lightfoot,  heem 
shoot  Jules,  mabby.  Dat  other  man,  heem  shoot 
both  of  us.  Non?  We  wait  here  until  night. 
Non,  m'sieu?" 

"But,  Jules,  to  be  so  near,  and  not  to  go  to  her!'* 
Dan  exclaimed. 

"Eeet  ees  better  to  wait,  m'sieu,  than  to  be 
keeled,  an'  not  go  at  all.  An'  mabby  Yvonne 
dere,  too,  by  now.  I  theenk  so." 

"You  think  that  Yvonne  has  got  there?" 

"Oui,  m'sieu.  She  start  las'  night.  Dat  road 
on  de  othair  side,  much  better  than  on  thees  side. 
Yvonne  geet  dere  queek.  If  we  show  ourselves 
now,  we  be  shot,  mabby-so.  Then  there  ees  no- 
body for  to  help  ma'm'selle  an'  Yvonne.  Then 
those  bad  men,  an'  dat  Wadleigh,  they  do  jus* 
what  they  like— eef  m'sieu  an'  Jules  are  dead." 

' '  You  are  right,  Jules.    I  see  it  now. ' ' 

"Purty  soon  we  go  on— when  they  no  can  see 
us."  Jules  seated  himself  upon  the  rocks  and 
produced  his  pipe,  having  first  taken  note  of  the 
direction  of  the  wind. 

Then,  just  as  night  began  to  fall,  they  were 
brought  to  their  feet  with  a  sudden  start. 

A  woman's  voice  rang  shrilly  out  upon  the  in- 
creasing gloom,  in  one  wild  cry  for  help. 


CHAPTER  XLII 

In  the  Nick  of  Time 

Dan  Randall  could  not  have  described,  after- 
ward, how  he  covered  the  space  that  intervened 
between  him  and  the  source  of  that  call  for  help. 

He  and  Jules  had  both  recognized  the  voice  of 
Joyce  Maitland  and  the  effect  of  it  upon  them, 
keyed-up  as  they  were,  was  electric  in  its  char- 
acter. 

Darkness  had  not  yet  fallen.  The  condition  was 
that  which  we  describe  as  "dusk." 

Black  Rock,  well  named,  loomed  directly  in 
front  of  them,  a  hundred  yards  away.  Between 
it,  and  them,  there  was  a  depression  in  the 
top  of  the  mountain,  which  Nature,  by  some  up- 
heaval of  the  past,  had  filled  with  a  jumble  of 
sharp-edged  stones  of  varying  sizes.  These  were 
not  easy  to  cross  in  haste,  but  both  Dan  and  Jules 
forgot  that  fact  when  they  heard  the  call  for  help. 

They  skimmed  over  the  tops  of  those  smaller 
rocks,  practically  side  by  side;  now  one  of  them 
would  be  a  yard  or  so  in  advance,  then  the  other 
—and  so  they  leaped  down  at  last  upon  a  huge 
flat  stone  as  level  as  a  floor,  directly  under  one  side 
of  the  big  black  boulder,  which  was  of  the  size  of 
a  small  house. 

There  Jules  darted  on  in  advance  of  Dan. 


IN  THE  NICK  OF  TIME  347 

They  turned  at  a  sharp  angle  around  one  end  of 
the  rock,  and  ran  down  a  steep  incline,  which  was, 
however,  wide  and  smooth,  and  which  wound 
around  the  rock  in  a  curve  as  symmetrical  as  if 
the  craft  of  an  engineer  had  planned  it.  Like  a 
spiral  staircase  without  the  steps,  and  much  less 
steep,  it  proved,  eventually,  to  be  the  pathway  that 
old  Pitou  had  described  with  almost  his  last 
breath. 

The  cry  for  help  was  not  repeated. 

More  than  likely,  Joyce,  after  that  one  impul- 
sive appeal,  had  remembered  how  futile  it  would 
be  to  call  for  help  at  a  place  so  remote  as  Black 
Rock. 

The  two  men  ran  lightly,  almost  noiselessly.  In 
descending  the  winding  path,  they  were  very 
nearly  side  by  side. 

It  was  almost  dark  under  the  shadow  of  the 
rock,  and  the  gloom  became  deeper  as  they  de- 
scended; but  soon  Dan  could  see  some  sort  of  a 
glow  ahead  of  him,  and  then  Jules  put  out  a  hand 
and  restrained  him,  and  they  came  almost  to  a 
stop. 

Dan  would  have  shaken  himself  free  and  rushed 
onward  had  he  not  discovered  at  the  same  instant 
that  they  were  directly  upon  the  scene  they  sought. 

A  space  suggestive  of  an  amphitheatre  of  small 
dimensions  was  directly  in  front  of  them.  A  small 
building  made  of  hodge-podge  stones  roughly 
piled  together,  and  the  chinks  between  them  filled 
with  earth,  occupied  the  center  of  it.  A  wide 
doorway,  through  which  a  team  of  horses  might 
have  been  driven  with  ease,  stood  open,  and  out  of 
it  a  bright  light  gleamed. 


348  UP  AGAINST  IT 

A  tableau  of  startling  realities  was  there,  too, 
plainly  revealed  to  them  by  the  light  within  the 
house.  Their  point  of  approach  to  it  was  such 
that  nearly  the  whole  interior  of  the  room  was  vis- 
ible to  both.  • 

By  common  consent  they  stopped,  for  they  real- 
ized that  their  nearness  was  not  suspected.  They 
saw,  too,  that  there  was  no  immediate  danger. 

Apparently  Ace  Wadleigh  and  the  man  who  had 
been  his  guide  from  Magician  pass  had  only  just 
arrived.  It  had  not  occurred  to  Dan  that  he  and 
Jules  had  so  nearly  overtaken  them.  Jules  had 
known  it,  but  he  had  said  nothing.  He  had 
strained  himself  and  Dan,  too,  to  their  utmost  ef- 
forts to  catch  up  with  the  two  men  before  Black 
Rock  should  be  reached,  but  he  had  known  at  the 
last  that  it  could  not  be  done,  so  he  had  said  noth- 
ing of  their  nearness. 

Evidently  Wadleigh  and  his  companion  had 
found  Yvonne  already  there,  without  in  the  least 
expecting  to  see  her;  and  that  the  fact  of  their  com- 
ing had  been  as  great  a  surprise  to  Yvonne,  as  her 
presence  was  to  them,  could  not  be  doubted. 

When  Dan  and  Jules  came  upon  the  scene, 
Yvonne  was  standing  over  near  one  corner  of  the 
room,  facing  the  wide-open  doorway.  She  held  a 
small  automatic  pistol  in  her  right  hand  (it  was 
one  that  Dan  had  given  her  long  ago,  and  had 
taught  her  how  to  use).  The  muzzle  of  it  was 
pointing  directly  at  Ace  Wadleigh,  who  had  come 
to  a  stop  a  few  paces  inside  the  door— apparently 
when  he  had  been  in  the  act  of  rushing  forward  to 
seize  her. 

Probably  he  had  intended  no  more  than  to  throw 


IN  THE  NICK  OF  TIME  349 

Yvonne  out  his  way,  for,  beside  her,  and  a  little  to 
the  rear,  upright,  pale,  courageous,  with  tightened 
lips  and  frightened  eyes,  stood  Joyce.  No  doubt 
it  had  been  the  unheralded  and  totally  unexpect- 
ed appearance  of  Ace  Wadleigh  upon  the  scene 
which  had  compelled  the  startled  cry  from  Joyce 
Maitland. 

Just  behind  Wadleigh,  nearer  to  the  door,  half 
crouching,  and  with  one  hand  upon  the  haft  of  a 
knife  that  was  thrust  under  a  belt  at  his  hips,  was 
as  villainous  a  looking  specimen  of  the  ' 'breed "- 
Indian  as  could  be  imagined.  Save  for  a  nervous 
twitching  of  the  fingers  that  clasped  at  the  knife- 
hilt,  he  was  as  motionless  as  the  others. 

Over  against  the  far  wall  of  the  room,  directly 
opposite  the  open  doorway,  was  a  rude  cot  cov- 
ered with  weather-tanned  skins  of  animals,  and 
blankets,  and  upon  the  cot,  where  he  had  half 
raised  himself  by  the  support  of  one  hand  and 
arm,  was  Lightfoot. 

He  was  drawn  and  haggard,  cadaverous  in  ap- 
pearance, and  wasted  almost  to  a  skin-wrapped 
skeleton.  But  his  eyes  had  lost  nothing  of  their 
savage  brilliancy,  and  they  were  gleaming 
strangely  and  furiously  at  Ace  Wadleigh. 

Such  was  the  tableau. 

Dan  and  Jules  had  come  upon  it  at  the  very  in- 
stant when  it  was  a  tableau.  Within  another  in- 
stant, or  a  moment,  or  a  minute  or  so,  all  would  be 
action  again.  It  was  quite  evident  that  the  scene 
had  been  in  the  nature  of  a  complete  surprise  to 
all  concerned. 

One  may  read  much  meaning  from  a  scene  like 
that. 


350  UP  AGAINST  IT 

An  open  doorway  into  another  room  of  the 
small  house  was  directly  behind  Joyce  and 
Yvonne,  as  if  they  had  just  stepped  through  it  to- 
gether, to  find  themselves  unexpectedly  face  to 
face  with  Wadleigh  and  his  murderous-looking 
companion.  Apparently  Ace  Wadleigh  had 
thrown  open  the  outer  door  and  entered  without 
any  expectation  of  finding  Joyce  Maitland  and 
Yvonne.  Quite  as  evident  was  it  that  Lightfoot 
had  not  been  looking  for  the  arrival  of  Wad- 
leigh. 

Dan  Randall,  watching  the  scene  for  a  time  that 
seemed  interminable,  but  which  was  actually  less 
than  half  a  dozen  seconds,  gathered  himself  for  a 
leap  forward,  but  at  the  same  instant  he  felt  the 
grip  of  Jules'  hand  upon  his  arm— and  then  Jules 
glided  past  him  through  the  open  doorway,  and 
with  a  cat-like  spring,  gripped  the  wrist  of  the 
Indian  that  held  the  knife. 

Wadleigh  whirled  about  in  this  tracks,  draw- 
ing as  he  did  so;  but  not  in  time  to  do  any  damage 
with  the  weapon  he  would  have  used. 

Dan's  hands  shot  forward.  One  of  them  gripped 
Wadleigh 's  throat,  the  other  seized  the  wrist  of 
the  hand  that  held  the  weapon,  and  bent  it  back- 
ward with  a  sudden  wrench  that  snapped  it  like  a 
pipe-stem.  The  weapon  fell  to  the  floor  of  the 
stone  cabin.  Wadleigh  followed  it,  felled  by  a 
blow  of  the  same  clenched  hand  that  had  broken 
his  wrist. 

Jules  raised  himself  from  atop  of  the  prostrate 
form  of  the  Indian,  at  the  same  moment;  the  In- 
dian stayed  where  he  was,  and  Jules,  half  apolo- 
getically, said: 


IN  THE  NICK  OF  TIME  351 

"Jules  not  do  dat.  Heem  fall  on  hees  own 
knife,  m'sieu;  but  eet  ees  ver'  good,  jus'  sam'." 

Lightfoot  fell  back  upon  the  cot,  the  fury  gone 
out  of  him.  He  closed  his  eyes.  A  slow  grimace, 
like  a  smile,  distorted  his  thin  lips.  He  lay  very 
still. 

Jules  went  nearer  to  Wadleigh,  and  stood  over 
him  in  silence.  Ace  made  no  attempt  to  rise,  nor 
to  speak.  His  eyes  were  open,  but  he  did  not  seem 
to  see  Jules;  he  kept  them  fixed  upon  Randall, 
whose  back  was  turned  to  him. 

Yvonne  let  fall  her  hand  that  held  the  weapon. 
Her  eyes  were  riveted  upon  Dan,  but  mingled  with 
the  look  of  adoration  in  them,  was  expectancy, 
also.  Dan  was  a  god  to  her,  in  some  ways.  She 
expected  great  things  of  him  in  that  moment.  She 
was  not  disappointed. 

Dan's  eyes  were  only  for  Joyce.  He  looked 
toward  her,  and  she  met  his  gaze,  steadily. 

He  discovered  in  their  depths,  something  that  he 
sought,  even  if  that  something  was  half  concealed 
behind  a  gathering  moisture. 

He  saw  her  lips  part  slightly,  as  if  to  speak,  and 
he  opened  his  arms  and  took  a  step  toward  her. 

"Come  to  me,  Joyce,"  he  said.  "I  want  you. 
Come." 

She  sprang  forward  with  a  glad  cry.  His  arms 
enfolded  her.  She  nestled  against  him.  He  held 
her  the  tighter,  protectingly,  with  his  face  lost 
sight  of  in  the  profusion  of  her  hair,  which  had 
fallen  from  its  fastenings  over  her  shoulders. 

Yvonne  clasped  her  hands  together  as  one  does 
when  one  prays,  or  gives  devout  thanks  to  God  for 
a  great  blessing.  Her  lips  moved  in  thankfulness. 


352  UP  AGAINST  IT 

The  one  prayer  that  had  been  her  constant  and 
earnest  supplication,  was  answered.  Her  lord  had 
found  his  love,  and  Yvonne  was  satisfied. 

She  dropped  her  eyes  again,  and  they  saw  some- 
thing else. 

With  a  cry  she  threw  herself  forward,  full  upon 
the  outstretched  figure  of  Ace  Wadleigh,  whose 
weapon  was  discharged  at  the  same  instant, 
though  harmlessly.  Yvonne  had  discovered  his 
stealthy  act  in  time.  In  another  instant  he  would 
have  shot  Dan,  or  Joyce,  or  both,  to  death.  With 
one  broken  wrist,  he  still  had  one  hand  to  use  for 
evil  deeds. 

Then,  when  it  was  over,  gentle  little  Yvonne  hid 
her  sweet  face  upon  Jules'  broad  chest,  and  wept 
silently,  with  tears  of  infinite  joy. 


The  Ways  of  Transgressors 

Lightfoot's  light  had  gone  out  forever  when  he 
closed  his  eyes  upon  the  certainty  of  the  outcome 
of  that  strange  scene.  He  was  quite  dead  when 
Joyce,  releasing  herself  from  Dan's  embrace, 
crossed  hastily  to  the  cot. 

"He  was  good  to  me,"  she  explained.  "Not  at 
first;  but  afterward.  He  was  cruel  to  me,  in  the 
beginning,  and  there  were  times  when  I  was  filled 
with  terror  because  of  him.  But  all  that  passed 
very  quickly. 

"That  day  in  the  pass,  after  the  storm,  when  I 
was  trying  to  get  to  the  pulpit,  where  I  knew  I 
would  find  fuel  and  food,  I— I  gave  out  very  sud- 
denly, I  think.  I  lost  consciousness;  and  when  I 
came  to  myself  I  was  in  some  sort  of  a  grotto 
among  the  rocks.  The  front  of  it  was  sealed  with 
snow.  There  was  a  fire,  burning  low,  near  the 
small  opening.  I  could  see  beyond  it,  and  knew 
that  it  was  night. 

"There  was  food  beside  me.  It  was  not  very 
choice,  but  I  was  ravenous.  I  ate;  and  I  quenched 
my  thirst  with  snow.  I  could  not  understand 
what  had  happened,  but  I  knew  that  I  had  been 
saved,  and  that  whoever  had  done  me  that  service 
would  return.  The  small  fire  kept  out  the  worst 


354  UP  AGAINST  IT 

of  the  cold.  I  realized  that  I  was  safe  for  the  mo- 
ment, and  I  was  content  to  wait. 

"I  ate  again.  Then  I  slept.  How  long,  I  do 
not  know.  The  following  day  was  far  advanced 
when  I  awoke.  Lightf oot,  the  Indian,  whom  I  dis- 
liked and  feared,  was  shaking  my  arm. 

"He  ordered  me  to  rise.  He  made  me  eat  of 
more  food  that  he  had  brought  to  me.  He  would 
not  tell  me  where  he  had  been,  but  I  knew.  He 
had  with  him  that  small,  black  satchel  that  I  gave 
to  you,  Dan,  to  hold  your  papers  when  you  wished 
to  carry  them  about  with  you.  I  knew  that  you 
kept  it  in  your  office.  That  fact  told  me  that 
Lightfoot  had  been  there,  and  had  stolen  it. 

"Lightf oot  thought  the  satchel  was  locked,  and 
he  did  not  dare,  then,  to  break  it  open.  He  did  not 
know  about  the  hidden  spring  that  releases  the 
catch,  which  was  the  very  thing  that  made  you 
want  it  for  your  papers.  When  we  started  for 
this  awful  place,  he  made  me  carry  it.  He  was 
laden  with  provisions  that  he  had  brought  with 
him  from  Janver. 

"Don't  ask  me  about  that  journey  to  get  here. 
It  was  horrible.  How  I  lived  to  tell  of  it,  I  don't 
know. 

"We  floundered  in  the  snow.  We  stumbled 
across  barriers  that  seemed  impassable.  Often  I 
fell  from  exhaustion.  It  was  at  such  times  that 
Lightfoot  was  brutal.  Sometimes  he  pounded  me, 
and  beat  me,  and  even  kicked  me  into  activity 
again,  after  the  manner  that  Indians  treat  their 
own  women.  But,  brutal  as  it  was,  it  doubtless 
saved  my  life. 

"We  got  here  somehow— in  the  middle  of  the 


THE  WAYS  OF  TRANSGRESSORS       355 

night— years  and  years  afterward,  it  seemed  to  me. 
While  Lightf  oot  started  a  fire,  I  fell  down  in  utter 
exhaustion  upon  that  couch. 

"When  I  awoke,  Lightf  oot  was  still  sleeping- 
there,  on  the  floor,  before  the  fire-place,  wrapped 
in  blankets.  He  had  thrown  blankets  over  me,  too. 

"I  arose,  quietly.  My  act  did  not  rouse  him.  I 
tiptoed  to  the  door  and  opened  it.  The  sun  was 
shining,  and  there  was  a  touch  of  warmth  in  the 
air.  I  recognized  the  smell  of  the  Chinook  wind, 
but  up  here  it  did  not  have  much  effect. 

"Then— wait,  Dan,  please— I  began  to  remem- 
ber things.  I  remembered  your  satchel  that  I  had 
been  forced  to  carry,  and  to  which  I  had  clung  be- 
cause it  was  yours.  There  had  been  scarcely  any 
weight  to  it,  at  all,  still,  I  would  have  dropped  it 
many  times  if  it  had  not  belonged  to  you. 

"And  then  I  remembered  that  I  had  dropped  it, 
at  the  very  last— at  the  moment  when  we  had  de- 
scended a  steep  and  winding  path  and  come  in 
sight  of  this  stone  hut. 

"I  turned  my  eyes  back  into  the  room  to  see  if 
Lightf  oot  had  picked  it  up.  It  was  not  there,  and, 
Indian  though  he  was,  he  was  still  sleeping.  I  had 
not  roused  him.  Probably  his  exhaustion  had 
been  even  greater  than  my  own,  although  he  was 
stronger,  and  better  able  to  withstand  it. 

"I  remembered  that  I  had  been  within  sight  of 
the  house  when  I  dropped  the  satchel,  and,  as  it 
was  night  then,  it  could  not  be  very  far  away.  I 
went  outside,  I  found  the  winding  path  down 
which  we  had  come.  I  came  upon  the  satchel  in  the 
middle  of  it. 

"I  touched  the  spring,  Dan,  and  looked  inside1 


356  UP  AGAINST  IT 

I  saw  what  it  contained.  Instantly  I  realized  the 
horror  of  permitting  Lightfoot  to  know.  I  knew 
that  he  might  awaken  at  any  moment,  and  come  in 
search  of  me.  But  there  was  no  place  to  hide  it, 
where  he  would  not  find  it  the  moment  he  searched. 

"Dan,  I  deliberately  sat  down  in  the  snow,  upon 
the  spot  where  the  satchel  had  been  dropped,  to  ob- 
literate the  marks  of  it.  No  trace  of  it  was  left 
when  I  got  up,  and  I  hurried  back  here,  bringing 
it  with  me.  Lightfoot,  wonder  of  wonders,  was 
still  sleeping.  He  must  have  been  worn  out,  in- 
deed, by  his  superhuman  exertions  in  bringing  me 
here. 

"But  he  stirred  as  I  approached,  and  I  thrust 
the  satchel  under  the  blankets  where  I  had  been 
sleeping. 

"He  started  to  his  feet.  He  saw  the  open  door, 
which  I  had  not  had  time  to  close. 

' '  'You  been  outside?'  he  demanded.  I  told  him 
I  had,  and  he  went  out  without  saying  another 
word. 

"I  watched  him  and  saw  him  follow  the  trail  I 
had  made.  He  bent  forward,  at  the  spot  where  I 
had  seated  myself  in  the  snow,  and  appeared  to  ex- 
amine it.  Then  he  came  back  into  the  hut. 

"  'What  for  you  sst?'  he  demanded.  I  shrugged 
my  shoulders  and  did  not  answer. 

"  'Where  ees  dat  sachet?'  he  asked  me,  then. 
'You  no  breeng  him  here  las'  night.  Where  you 
drop  heem?  Hey?' 

"I  shrugged  my  shoulders  again  without  an- 
swering. 

'  'He  asked  no  more  questions.  He  fixed  the  fire. 
He  got  things  to  eat,  out  of  the  pack  he  had 


THE  WAYS  OF  TRANSGRESSORS      357 

brought.  He  made  me  work,  too,  scowling  so  that 
I  was  frightened  if  I  manifested  any  inclination  to 
refuse.  All  the  while  I  was  in  terror  lest  he 
should  discover  what  was  hidden  under  the 
blankets. 

"  To  all  of  the  questions  I  asked  him,  as  to  why 
he  had  brought  me  here,  he  made  no  answer.  He 
rarely  spoke  at  all,  save  in  monosyllables;  but  his 
eyes  followed  me  constantly,  and  gradually  I  be- 
came deathly  afraid  of  him. 

"Later,  he  went  out,  and  I  knew  that  he  was 
searching  for  the  satchel.  I  knew  that  he  would 
not  find  it,  and  I  dreaded  the  consequences.  Dur- 
ing his  absence  I  found  another  hiding  place  for  it. 

"But  he  did  not  return  during  all  of  that  day,  or 
all  of  the  night  following;  and  it  was  far  into  the 
next  day  before  I  made  up  my  mind  that  he  did  not 
mean  to  come  back. 

"I  believed  that  I  could  find  my  way  back  to 
Janver,  but  it  was  too  late  to  start  that  day.  At 
night  I  barricaded  the  door,  so  that  he  would  have 
to  ask  to  get  inside  if  he  came  back. 

"But  he  did  not  come;  and  in  the  morning,  as 
soon  as  it  was  light,  I  started  out.  The  weather 
had  moderated.  It  was  not  very  cold.  I  believed 
that  I  could  find  my  way  out  of  my  troubles.  I  felt 
that  I  would  rather  die  on  the  mountain  than  to  re- 
main here  an  indefinite  time,  alone  with  Lightf  oot. 

"I  found  him,  Dan.  He  had  gone  to  some  cache 
of  his  to  bring  more  provisions.  Returning,  he 
had  slipped  and  fallen.  The  burden  he  carried 
had  fallen  upon  him.  He  had  been  two  nights  and 
a  day  in  the  open.  It  is  a  wonder  how  he  lived 
through  it  at  all. 


358  UP  AGAINST  IT 

"Both  his  legs  and  one  of  his  arms  were  broken. 
He  had  tried  to  drag  himself  back  to  this  place,  but 
had  not  accomplished  half  the  distance.  Then  he 
resigned  himself  to  die.  He  was  unconscious 
when  I  found  him.  But  I  knew  that  he  lived. 

'  'I  remembered  that  I  had  seen  an  old  toboggan- 
sled,  here,  in  the  cabin.  Doubtless,  one  that  had 
been  used  some  time  in  the  past  to  bring  in  sup- 
plies. Don't  ask  me  how  I  got  him  here,  at  last, 
but  I  did  it.  It  was  three  days  after  that  before  he 
came  back  to  consciousness.  In  the  meantime  he 
raved,  constantly,  in  his  own  dialect.  But  his 
broken  bones  rendered  it  impossible  for  him  to 
leave  the  cot. 

"Dan,  dear,  from  that  day  to  this  one,  I  have 
cared  for  him,  tended  him,  nursed  him.  It  has 
been  awful.  Awful.  But  there  was  no  other 
way.  There  were  no  remedies  here.  There  has 
been  nothing  that  I  could  do.  He  would  not  hear 
of  my  making  an  attempt  to  bring  help.  Oh,  Dan, 
Dan,  I  am  glad  that  you  came.  Wait,  dear,  I  am 
almost  done. 

"Lightfoot,  in  his  stolid  fashion,  appreciated 
what  I  did  for  him.  He  told  me  a  great  many 
things  about  Taggart  and  the  others,  and  about 
Ace,  that  I  did  not  know;  and  about  a  man  called 
Gaffney,  too. 

"He  warned  me,  also,  to  go  away  from  here  as 
soon  as  he  was  dead.  He  told  me,  all  too  plainly, 
that  terrible  things  would  happen  to  me  if  I  re- 
mained. Taggart  had  ordered  him  to  bring  me 
here,  if  it  could  be  done,  and  to  hold  me  here  until 
he  could  come  here  himself.  Lightfoot  was  to 
fasten  me  in  while  he  went  to  inform  Taggart  of 


THE  WAYS  OF  TRANSGRESSORS      359 

his  success;  and  then  (really  I  do  not  understand  it 
all)  Ben  Taggart  was  to  make  use  of  me  in  some 
way  to  forward  his  own  schemes  against  you  and 
Ace. 

"To-day— this  morning— Lightfoot  asked  me  to 
go  away  and  leave  him.  To  send  help  to  him  as 
soon  as  possible,  but  to  go.  I  think  he  knew  that 
he  was  dying.  I  was  ready  to  start,  and  was  at 
the  door,  when  dear  little  Yvonne  came.  We  had 
decided  to  wait  until  to-morrow,  and  then  to  go 
away  together.  When  Lightfoot  heard  that,  he 
smiled,  and  said: 

"  'Ver'  good.  To-morrow,  Lightfoot  be  dead.' 
He  knew." 

"Yes,  he  probably  knew  that  he  could  not  live 
another  day,"  Dan  replied.  "But  what  of  that 
other  one?  I  never  saw  him  before.  Who  is 
he?" 

' '  I  don 't  know, ' '  Joyce  said.  ' '  I  never  saw  him 
before,  either." 

"I  know,"  Jules  interjected.  "Heem  called 
Bad  Pierre.  Heem  comme  from  up  Edmonton 
country.  Heem  comme  to  Janver  with  dat  bum- 
Gaff  ney— to  guide  heem.  Dat  how  m'sieu  Wad- 
leigh  know  heem.  .  .  .  Non?  Oui.  Then,  heem 
fall  on  hees  own  knife,  when  I  grab  hees  wrist. 
Look,  m'sieu,"  he  added,  addressing  Dan,  directly, 
"heem  I  see  ver'  many  times  with  m'sieu  Wad- 
leigh,  jus'  about  de  time  when  de  bum  mak'  de 
writings  to  look  sam'  as  you  write." 

Ace  Wadleigli,  who  was  seated  upon  a  stool  in 
a  far  corner  of  the  room  with  his  broken  wrist 
bound  in  splints  of  Jules'  arrangement,  and  with 
Jules  keeping  watch  over  him,  spoke  up,  in  his 


360  UP  AGAINST  IT 

cool,  leisurely,  and  insolent  manner,  while  the 
ghost  of  an  ironical  smile  hovered  upon  his  lips: 

"I  can  ease  your  minds  in  regard  to  Bad  Pete," 
he  said.  '  'I  see  no  reason  why  I  should  not  do  so. 
Jules  is  correct  about  his  coming  to  Janver  as  Gaff- 
ney's  guide.  But  Gaffney's  money  had  given  out. 
He  could  not  pay  Black  Pete.  So  Black  Pete  de- 
cided that  he  would  work  for  me,  for  some  ready 
cash.  That  is  all  you  need  to  know.  I  sent  for 
him  as  soon  as  I  could,  after  the  thaw.  I  prom- 
ised him  a  big  reward  if  he  would  find  out  what 
had  become  of  Joyce.  He  and  Lightf  oot  had  been 
as  chummy  as  two  Indians  ever  can  be.  I  suppose 
Lightfoot  must  have  told  him  about  this  place,  or 
have  had  him  here,  sometime,  perhaps.  Anyhow, 
Peter  found  them  both,  and  without  letting  them 
suspect  that  he  had  been  here,  came  to  me  with  the 
report.  He  said  that  Lightfoot  was  as  good  as 
dead,  then,  and  thai  probably  Joyce  would  be  all 
alone  by  the  time  we  got  here." 

Joyce  took  a  step  forward,  toward  him. 

"What  would  have  happened,  Ace,  if  you  had 
found  me  here  alone,  and  unprotected?"  she 
asked  him,  gazing  steadily  into  his  eyes. 

For  a  moment  he  returned  her  gaze;  then  he 
dropped  his  own. 

"What  I  intended  to  make  happen,  and  what 
might  have  happened  in  such  an  event,  does  not 
matter,  now,"  he  replied,  slowly.  "You  were  not 
alone.  The  incident  is  closed.  The  only  person  I 
found  here  whose  end  I  envy  lies  there."  He 
pointed  toward  Lightf  oot 's  body,  on  the  cot.  '  'He 
died  a  natural  death." 


CHAPTER  XLIV 

How  One  Man  Could  Hate 

They  buried  the  two  bodies  in  one  grave,  made 
large  enough  to  receive  them  side  by  side.  Jules 
fashioned  two  rude  crosses  of  wood  to  stand  at 
their  heads.  Yvonne  passed  a  solemn  hour  in  the 
service  of  each  one  of  them,  counting  her  beads, 
and  murmuring  prayers  for  the  repose  of  their 
souls.  And  surely  none  could  have  had  a  more 
earnest  intercessor  than  she  was. 

That  took  place  the  following  morning. 

Two  hours  before  noon  they  started  upon  their 
return,  taking  the  way  by  which  Yvonne  had 
come,  it  being  much  shorter  and  easier. 

But,  before  they  started,  Dan  sent  Jules  and 
Yvonne  and  Joyce  outside  to  wait  for  him,  while 
he  remained  alone  in  the  larger  room  of  the  cabin 

with  Ace  Wadleigh with  his  one-time  friend 

whom  he  had  loved  and  trusted. 

"Sit  still,  Ace,"  he  said,  calmly.  "I  am  not  go- 
ing to  take  you  back,  and  hand  you  over  to  justice. 
Justice  will  overtake  you  of  its  own  accord,  soon 
enough— unless  you  can  think  up  a  way  to  square 
yourself  with  it.  So  far  as  I  am  concerned,  you 
are  free  to  go  wherever  you  please  as  soon  as  I 
have  finished  with  what  I  have  to  say  to  you." 

"I  suppose  I  ought  to  thank  you  for  your  gen- 


362  UP  AGAINST  IT 

erosity,"  Wadleigh  replied,  with  a  half  sneer.  "1 
am  not  sure  whether  I  want  to,  or  not." 

"You  need  not.  I  neither  wish  for  thanks  from 
you,  nor  deserve  them.  What  I  am  doing  now  is 
done  for  the  Boniface  Wadleigh  I  used  to  know; 
not  for  the  man  you  are  now.  But,  more  than 
anything  else,  I  do  it  for  my  own  sake." 

"I  hope  you're  not  going  to  preach." 

"No.  Ace,  I  wonder  if  you  knew  who  Gaffney 
really  was?" 

"Of  course  I  knew.  I  found  it  out  the  night 
after  he  had  finished  signing  those  deeds  with  your 
name.  He  got  drunker  than  usual  that  night, 
after  it  was  over.  If  it  had  not  been  that  he  hated 
you,  and  feared  you,  too,  for  what  he  had  done  to 
you,  he  never  would  have  committed  those  forger- 
ies forme." 

"So  I  supposed— after  I  had  found  out  who  he 
was,"  Dan  remarked. 

"When  did  you  discover  it?"  Wadleigh  asked. 
"I  am  quite  willing  to  admit  that  I  would  have 
gone  away  from  here,  even  now,  after  you  have  set 
me  free,  leaving  you  to  believe,  still,  that  you  were 
a  murderer.  When  did  you  discover  that  you 
were  not  one?" 

"It  was  never  a  murder,  Ace.  I  supposed  that 
I  had  killed  a  man,  and  I  fled.  I  had  nothing  to 
blame  myself  for— other  than  for  the  consequence 
of  what  I  believed  I  had  done.  I  had  cause  enough 
to  kill  him,  God  knows.  I  believed,  even  when  I 
ran  away,  that  I  could  stay  where  I  was  and  be  ac- 
quitted, if  all  the  truth  were  known.  But  to  do 
that  meant  a  revelation  of  all  the  unhappy  history 
of  my  sister,  who  had  been  his  wife.  I  preferred 


HOW  ONE  MAN  GOULD  HATE        363 

to  do  as  I  did.  We  will  drop  that  part  of  the  sub- 
ject now." 

"But,  you  haven't  told  me  yet  how  and  when 
you  found  out  that  Guy  Fenney  did  not  die  by  your 
hand.  You  couldn't  have  recognized  him  when 
you  found  him  at  the  pulpit.  You  never  knew 
him,  did  you?  You  never  saw  him  until  that 
night  you  thought  you  killed  him,  did  you?" 

"No." 

"Well,  how  did  you  find  it  out?  How  did  you 
discover  that  there  was  never  even  an  indictment 
returned  against  you?" 

"What?  Not  even  that?  No  indictment 
against  me?" 

"You  did  not  know  that,  did  you?  And  I  have 
told  you  the  news.  I'm  sorry.  However,  it 
doesn't  matter.  If  there  had  been  an  indictment, 
you  could  have  had  it  quashed,  now.  Still " 

"Why,  then,  was  I  pursued,  Ace?  Why  were 
officers  sent  after  me,  even  into  the  Far  North?" 

"You  weren't  pursued.  Officers  were  not  sent 
after  you.  I  only  made  you  believe  so.  You 
might  have  remained  Daniel  R.  Vanderyeer  all 
this  time,  with  never  a  soul  to  object  to  it,  or  to 
ask  you  an  unpleasant  question,  if  you  had  chosen 
to  do  so— or  if  I  had  been  decent  enough  toward 
you  to  put  you  wise.  Great  Scott,  man,  don't  you 
suppose  that  the  Law  would  have  found  you,  if 
the  Law  had  wanted  you?" 

"I  do  suppose  so,  now.  I  had  not  thought  of  it, 
in  just  that  way." 

' '  I  hated  you,  Dan.  I  always  hated  you.  I  hate 
you  now.  I  can't  help  it.  It  is  inside  of  me.  You 
had  everything  that  I  did  not  have,  and  that  I 


364  UP  AGAINST  IT 

wanted  with  all  my  heart  and  soul.  You  had  mil- 
lions, in  money.  You  had  that  phenomenal 
strength.  You  had  that  wonderful  physique. 
You  had  kindness  of  heart,  generosity  of  spirit, 
graciousness  of  manner,  largeness  of  soul,  bigness 
of  intellect,  unbounded  capacity  for  whatever  you 
undertook;  and  you  had  them  all  in  bulk;  a  sur- 
feit of  them.  ...  I  had  not  one  of  them.  I  had 
smatterings  of  each,  but  the  completion  of  none. 
So,  I  envied  you;  and,  envying,  hated  you.  That 
is  what  has  brought  me  here,  where  I  am  now,  an 
outlaw;  the  thing  that  you  thought  you  were  but 
which  could  not  crush  your  spirit,  even  at  that. 
Then,  there  was  Joyce.  Because  of  her  I  hated 
you  ten  thousand  million  times  more  than  ever  be- 
fore. Oh,  let  me  talk  on,  while  I  am  in  the  humor 
for  it.  We  may  as  well  have  a  show-down,  now; 
there  will  never  be  another  opportunity.  And  I'm 
not  talking  because  I  hate  you  any  the  less,  for  I 
don't.  More,  if  anything." 

"Go  on,  then." 

"I  knew  Joyce  before  you  did.  She  was  in 
Janver  while  you  were  up  in  the  Great  Slave  coun- 
try, and  I  was  keeping  you  there  with  my  lies.  I 
wanted  her.  I  loved  her.  She  was  getting  used 
to  me,  and  beginning  to  believe  that  she  might 
love  me  some  day,  until  you  came  down  from  the 
North,  and  found  her  in  the  snow  beside  her  dead 
guide— and  brought  her  in  to  Janver,  where  you 
found  me  again.  That's  all.  If  wishes  could  slay 
a  man,  you  would  wither  up  to  nothingness  right 
now,  and  disappear  through  that  crack  under  the 
door  with  not  so  much  as  a  memory  left  of  you. 
Fine  state  of  mind  to  be  in,  isn't  it?" 


HOW  ONE  MAN  COULD  HATE        365 

"I  cannot  even  imagine  it,  Ace." 

"Of  course  you  can't.  That's  another  reason 
why  I  hate  you.  Now,  suppose  you  reply  to  my 
question  that  I  have  asked  you  several  times." 

"What  was  it?    I  have  forgotten." 

"When  did  you  discover  that  Guy  Fenney  was 
alive?  Was  it  the  similarity  of  the  names  that 
suggested  it?  Gaff ney— Guy  Fenney?" 

"No.  His  own  confession,  written  out  at 
length,  detailing  the  entire  story  of  it  all,  even  to 
the  reasons  which  would  have  justified  me  if  I  had 
killed  him,  were  in  that  belt  that  was  strapped 
around  his  body  over  his  undershirt,  when  you  left 
him  at  Devil's  Pulpit,  to  die.  It  told,  also,  that  he 
was  seeking  me,  to  kill  me." 

"Oh.  .  .  .  I  see.  .  .  .  Pity  I  didn't  think  to  look 
for  that  sort  of  a  thing  on  him.  .  .  .  Well,  you'd 
better  go  now,  hadn't  you,  if  you  want  to  make 
Bluerock  before  dark?  That  is,  if  you  still  intend 
to  leave  me  here." 

"Yes.  I  will  go,  now.  There  are  provisions 
enough  here,  to  last  you  for  days  to  come,  if  you 
choose  to  remain.  Jules  has  set  the  broken  bones 
as  well  as  a  doctor  could  do  it.  I  have  put  some 
money  in  that  tobacco  jar,  over  the  fireplace. 
You  can  take  it  with  you,  or  leave  it  there,  as  you 
prefer.  I  have  thrown  it  aside.  That  is  all.  If 
you  escape  the  red-coats,  I  wish  you  nothing  but 
honest  success  for  the  future." 

There  were  no  good-byes  uttered  on  either  side. 

Dan  swung  around  and  left  the  cabin,  closing 
the  door  after  him. 

Wadleigh  watched  him  go,  an  odd  and  insolent 
smile  upon  his  face  as  he  did  so. 


CHAPTER  XLV 

When  Dreams  Come  True 


"What  do  you  think  of  it,  sweetheart?" 

"It's  just  grand.  That  is  the  only  word  I  can 
think  of,  Dan,  dear;  and  that  one  doesn't  half  ex- 
press it,"  Joyce  replied,  looking  fondly  at  him, 
and  bending  forward  in  the  saddle  to  pat  the 
arched  neck  of  her  horse. 

"Does  look  good,  doesn't  it?"  Dan  nodded  his 
head  in  an  emphatic  gesture  as  he  spoke. 

They  were  at  the  top  of  the  Ridge,  exactly  at  the 
spot  where  Dan  had  halted  to  fasten  on  his  snow- 
shoes  that  night  before  the  great  storm.  They  had 
ridden  out  there  to  see  the  late  afternoon  train  as 
it  issued  from  Magician  pass  on  its  way  to  Janver. 

The  "It"  referred  to  was  the  train  itself.  They 
had  ridden  out  there  to  watch  for  its  coming,  every 
night  for  a  week,  and  they  found  it  just  as  won- 
derful this  seventh  night  as  it  had  been  on  the  first 
occasion. 

"We'll  have  the  Black  Gorge  route  running  in 
thirty  days,"  Dan  told  her  a  moment  later.  That 
was  another  remark  that  he  had  made  to  her  every 
evening  of  the  seven.  But  it  was  just  as  new,  and 
just  as  interesting,  and  just  as  wonderful,  as  it  had 
been  with  its  first  utterance;  and  her  reply  was  the 
same. 


WHEN  DREAMS  COME  TRUE         367 

"Won't  that  be  fine?  And  I  can  ride  through 
the  gorge  on  the  first  train  with  you?" 

"Of  course,  sweetheart.  Come,  now.  Let's  go 
back.  Yvonne  will  be  wondering  if  we  are  going 
to  be  late  again." 

June  had  come,  and  with  it,  their  wedding  day; 
also  the  day  of  the  official  opening  of  the  Janver 
Cut-off  over  Magician  pass.    Both  events  were' 
now  seven  days  in  the  past. 

In  the  Black  Gorge  to  the  west  of  Janver  more 
than  a  thousand  men  were  at  work,  driving  one 
another  for  the  premiums,  and  doing  their  ut- 
most to  win  the  praise  of  the  man  they  worked 
for. 

They  could  not  get  used  to  that  new  name.  They 
liked  Dan  Randall  best.  Dan  never  saw  nor  heard 
the  other  one  save  on  addressed  envelopes,  and 
when  men  journeyed  out  from  the  East  to  see  him 
and  to  consult  with  him. 

Of  Wadleigh  there  had  never  been  a  sign  since 
that  parting  with  him  at  Black  Rock,  on  the  moun- 
tain. The  police  had  not  taken  him.  There  was 
little  doubt  that  he  had  made  good  use  of  the  thou- 
sand dollars  that  Dan  had  left  inside  of  the  tobacco 
jar  over  the  fireplace. 

Taggart,  paralyzed  from  the  hips  down,  had, 
nevertheless,  gone  back  to  contracting,  and  was  a 
big  factor  in  the  pushing  of  the  Black  Gorge 
branch  of  the  Cut-off.  Dan,  when  he  received 
back  the  control  of  the  M.  &  J.  R.  R.,  overlooked 
Taggart 's  and  Crosby's  past  mistakes,  and  took 
them  back  on  precisely  the  same  conditions  that 
they  had  enjoyed  before  that  epoch-making  direc- 
tors' meeting.  Cuthbert,  evidently  doubtful  of 


368  UP  AGAINST  IT 

what  might  happen  to  him,  had  disappeared,  none 
knew  whither. 

Buxton  had  been  best  man  at  the  wedding. 
Also,  he  was  general  manager  of  the  railroad,  as 
well  as  the  owner  of  a  very  comfortable  block  of 
stock,  which  Dan  had  insisted  upon  awarding  to 
him. 

When  Joyce  and  Dan  dismounted  at  the  door  of 
their  home,  Jules  was  there  to  take  charge  of  their 
horses.  Jules  had  never  been  quite  so  happy  as  he 
was  in  those  days  of  summer. 

Yvonne  opened  the  door  for  them  when  they 
went  up  the  short  path  to  it. 

Her  sweet  face  seemed  prettier  than  ever  as  she 
smiled,  and  courtesied,  and  then  impulsively 
caught  at  their  hands  and  kissed  them.  But 
Joyce  caught  the  little  woman  in  her  arms,  and 
kissed  her  on  both  cheeks,  and  Yvonne  laughed 
aloud  with  pleasure,  blushing  with  pride  at  the  ca- 
ress, for  she  knew  that  it  was  prompted  by  love. 

Frequently,  all  four  of  them  went  over  to  the 
stone  house  at  White  Lake  for  a  week-end,  and 
then  Jules  would  have  a  great  time  rollicking  with 
his  dogs,  and  manufacturing  "things"  with  tools 
—for  that  was  the  pastime  in  which  Jules  found 
the  greatest  pleasure. 

Dan  had  never  needed  all  the  papers  concerning 
which  he  had  been  so  careful  to  instruct  Yvonne 
that  night  before  the  storm.  The  confession  of 
Gaffney,  otherwise  Guy  Fenney,  had  obviated  that. 
But  he  kept  them,  "jus'  sam',"  as  Jules  would 
have  put  it. 

They  never  spoke  of  Ace  Wadleigh,  although 
Dan  caught  himself  thinking  about  the  man,  often, 


WHEN  DREAMS  COME  TRUE         369 

wondering  if  he  would  ever  turn  up  again,  and 
when,  and  in  what  manner. 

In  their  own  snug  living  room,  by  themselves, 
with  the  door  closed,  Joyce  went  up  to  her  stalwart 
husband  and  lifted  her  face  for  a  caress,  and  he 
put  his  strong  arms  around  her  and  held  her  close, 
and  in  silence. 

Then  Yvonne  came  to  the  door  and  summoned 
them  to  the  evening  meal. 


THE  END 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


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